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THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 



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Paintini; hy /■'. /;'. S,-liu(>noi-cr 

Ret^roduccd by Pcnnls.uon of '• The Ladies' Home Journal " 



© Curtis Fiiblislnn,^ i ,,:iipaii^ 



THE ALLIED AIRPLANES AND ARTILLERY WORKED HAVOC IN THE RANKS OF 

THE RETREATING HUNS 



THE STORY OF 
THE GREAT WAR 



BY 



WILLIAM STANLEY BRAITHWAITE 



WITH TWELVE ILLUSTRATIONS IN COLOR 




NEW YORK 

FREDERICK A. STOKES COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 



•7 

,B7 



Copyright, 1919, by 
Frederick A. Stokes Company 



All Rights Reserved 



m 19 1^13 



(Q)CI.A561C33 



TO MY CHILDREN 

Fiona William 

Katharine Paul 

Edith Arnold 

AND 

TO ALL CHILDREN OF 

EVERY RACE AND CREED 

UNITED 

THROUGH THE IDEALS FOR WHICH 

OUR COUNTRY ENTERED THE GREAT WAR 

TO MAKE 

TRUE AMERICANS OF TOMORROW 

AND 

PRESERVE THE HOPE OF THE WORLD 



LIBRARY OP CONGRESS - BINDING RECORD 
Call No. D^22.T.BT n^tP 11/29/78 

Author BRAITHWAITE 

Title STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 



CI, 2 
Vol. Copy No, of vols.__t2 

Date Block & Item 



Specs RErARE, RTYF.F. H, mT.OR SQ8 

OU-?ii I r^ov U/72 ^ 






CONTENTS 



Part I. HOW THE WAR CAME ABOUT 

CHAPl-EB PAGE 

I A Short View of a Long Century 1 

II The Challenge of the German Empire 11 

III The Teutonic Allies 21 

IV The Story of the Declaration of War 26 



Part II. THE EMBATTLED NATIONS 

I The Story of Belgium 37 

II The Story of Serbia 46 

III The Story of France and Her Colonies .... 52 

IV The Story of Great Britain and Her Colonies . . 59 

V The Story of Russia 68 

VI The Story of Italy 76 

VII The Story of Roumania 81 

VIII The Story of the United States .... .86 

IX The Story of Greece 95 

X The Story of the Other Belligerents .... 99 

XI The Story of the Neutrals 105 



Part III. HOW THE WAR WAS FOUGHT 

I The Campaigns of 1914 113 

II The Campaigns of 1915 . 142 

III The Campaigns of 1916 ^ . . 170 

IV The Campaigns of 1917 '. . , 199 

V The Campaigns of 1918 -\ . . 222 



Part IV. THE NAVIES IN ACTION 

I The Navies in 1914 253 

II The Navies in 1915 263 

III The Navies in 1916 and 1917 269 

IV The Navies in 1918 276 

vii 



viii CONTENTS 

Part V. MARVELS OF ACHIEVEMENT 

CHAPTER PAGB 

I How Men Took Wings and Fought 285 

II How THE Doctors Fought and Won Victories . . . 294 

III How the Inventors Fought . 300 

IV How THE People Fought at Home 309 

V Volunteer Welfare Service 316 

Part VI. THE GREAT PERSONALITIES OF 
THE WAR 

I The Rulers: 

King Albert of Belgium; King George of England; 
King Victor Emmanuel of Italy; King Peter of 
Serbia; Grand Duchess Marie Adelaide of Luxem- 
bourg; Queen Marie of Roumania; President Ray- 
mond Poincare of France; President Woodrow Wil- 
son of the United States 327 

II The Prime Ministers: 

David Lloyd George of England; Georges Clemen- 
ceau, " The Tiger " of France; M. Sazonof of Rus- 
sia; Vittorio Orlando of Italy; E. Venizelos of 
Greece 337 

III The Generals: 

Marshal Joffre, Marshal Foch, Marshal Petain, of 
France; Lord Kitchener, Viscount French, Field- 
Marshal Sir Douglas Haig, General Maude, General 
Sir E. H. H. Allenby, of England; Count Cardorna, 
General Diaz, of Italy; Grand Duke Nicholas, Gen- 
eral BrusilofF, of Russia; General John J. Pershing, 
of the United States 348 

IV The Admirals: 

Sir John Jellicoe, Sir David Beatty, of England; 
Admiral William S. Sims, Admiral Hugh Rodman, 
of the United States 360 

Part III. THE PEACE CONGRESS AT PARIS 
I The Story of the Peace Conference 367 



ILLUSTRATIONS 

The Allied airplanes and artillery worked havoc in the ranks of 

the retreating Huns {Painting by F. E. Schoonover) . Frontispiece 

FACINU 
PAOK 

It was a solemn moment when President Wilson urged Congress to 

declare war on Germany (Painting by F. S. Brunner) . . 32 

" The life of civilization is in your hands," said Roosevelt to the 

soldiers 86 

The " moppers up " left nothing alive behind them (Painting by 

Cyrus Cuneo) 142 

The Thunder of the British guns awoke the echoes of the Darda- 
nelles (Painting by Edgar F. Wittmach) 156 

The terrible engine moved clumsily upon the German lines 

(Painting by Clinton Pettee) 186 

" The Spirit of 1917 " (Painting by L. A. Shafer) 200 

The end of the last crusade came when General Allenby entered 
Jerusalem at the head of the British army (Painting by F. S. 
Brunner) 218 

The fleeing Germans learned that the Americans were not too 

proud to fight (Painting by Gayle Porter Hoskins) . . . 226 

High above the earth daredevils fought each other (Painting by 

Cyrus Cuneo) 288 

The American cannoneers hurled gas on the German trenches 

(Painting by Vincent Lynch) 306 

In the Cathedral at Meaux was held a Thanksgiving of Comrades 

in Arms (From French Official Photograph) 368 



Part I 
HOW THE WAR CAME ABOUT 



THE 
STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

CHAPTER I 

A SHORT VIEW OF A LONG CENTUEY 

THERE was once a great battle fought in Belgium, 
not far from the city of Brussels, at a village called 
Waterloo, when Napoleon Bonaparte was de- 
feated by the British and Prussians together. This 
battle took place exactly one hundred years before the first 
year of the Great War in which the British and their 
AUies were fighting against, instead of with, the Prussians 
and their kin of the German empire. While Napoleon 
was fighting the British and Prussians at Waterloo, — a 
battle which took place one hundred days after his escape 
from the island of Elba in the Mediterranean Sea, where 
he had been in exile, — the statesmen of Europe were gath- 
ered at a congress in Vienna. They had met there to set- 
tle affairs in Europe, supposing Napoleon was secure 
from doing harm. But Napoleon escaped from his exile 
and attacked his enemies, and when he was defeated at 
Waterloo, and could do harm no more, the statesmen at 

Vienna made a treaty which was intended to keep France 

1 



2 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

from disturbing the peace, and also to make it impossible 
for another tyrant like Napoleon to arise and make mili- 
tary conquests. 

This treaty, which is known as the Treaty of Vienna, 
was to serve other purposes. It was meant to destroy the 
military power of a nation that had learned to love war 
and conquest through the military genius of its great em- 
peror. But the statesmen at Vienna destroyed one evil 
only to create another. They put all the power of gov- 
ernment in the hands of the rulers to whom the people 
were obliged to submit. This was what is called "autoc- 
racy." It was the way that an Austrian statesman, Prince 
Metternich, believed that nations ought to be governed, 
and Metternich took the leading part in spreading his 
ideas all over Europe. I want to remind you of this idea 
of autocracy which was the most important result of the 
Congress of Vienna that was held in 1815, because its effect 
upon the course of history is plain. It was the cause of 
revolutions in every European country, for as a result of 
it the people demanded constitutions, somewhat like ours 
in the United States, which would give them a right to 
say how they should be governed. 

The people of Europe were a long while in forcing con- 
stitutions from their rulers. It was not, in fact, until 
after Prince Metternich was overthrown as the chief min- 
ister of the Austrian emperor in 1848, and was obliged 
to flee in exile to England, that there was any hope of 
the people governing themselves. In the year 1848, all 
of Europe was in revolution, and for a while it looked 



A VIEW OF A CENTURY 3 

as if the kings and princes would lose their power to op- 
press their subjects any longer. They made promises 
which quieted the people, but these were not kept, and' 
before long their rule was the same as ever. Their posi- 
tion, however, as absolute masters of so many millions of 
people in the various countries, was weakened ; for though 
the people were for a time defeated in their desires, they 
began to realize that they were too strong for one man 
to oppress them just because he was a king, or for a hand- 
ful of men to do so because they were his ministers. 

If there had been another statesman of Prince Metter- 
nich's crafty and unprincipled ability to reorganize the 
rulers through another alliance after 1848, similar to The 
Holy Alliance which he created in 1815, freedom might 
have been much further off. But it was not until our day 
that another man arose who wished to control the peoples 
of other nations besides his own. This man was William 
Hohenzollern, the former emperor of Germany. The way 
for him, however, had been prepared by an earlier Prus- 
sian statesman, Otto von Bismarck, who took up and per- 
fected the idea of autocracy in Germany when all the 
other nations, except Russia and Austria, were winning 
their liberties from kings and princes. 

Bismarck did not believe that the people had any right, 
or knew, as a matter of fact, how to rule themselves. This 
idea he impressed upon his sovereign, the King of Prussia. 
This, of course, was before the German states were united 
into the mighty empire, which it was Bismarck's ambition 
to make, and in the days when Prussia and Austria were 



4 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

both striving to become the most powerful German state. 
Bismarck had three great ambitions to fulfill in his 
career. One was to humiliate Austria so that she would be 
forced to acknowledge the leadership of Prussia among 
the German states ; the second was to defeat France which 
had been the strongest nation in Europe and had practi- 
cally, since the days of Louis XIV, dominated the affairs 
of Europe; and with France too helpless to protest, his 
third ambition was to unite all the ,German states into a 
mighty empire with Prussia at its head and the master of 
Europe. 

Bismarck may have been hurried in carrying out his 
schemes for Prussia's greatness by what he saw taking 
place in the neighboring countries. Italy, which had been 
like Germany a group of separate states but of one race, 
threw off the yoke of Austria and became united, through 
the efforts of a Piedmontese statesman, Count Cavour, 
into a kingdom under Victor Emmanuel II. France was 
a republic with Louis Napoleon Bonaparte, a nephew of 
the great Napoleon, as president, who a little later 
tricked the French people to turn their republic into an 
empire and to accept him as emperor. But everywhere 
popular sentiment was for national liberty, that is, for the 
freedom of the people to govern themselves — everywhere, 
it must be remembered, in all of western Europe except 
in Prussia. And to keep the Prussians tied to the will of 
their king, Bismarck had to make him the most powerful 
ruler in Europe and the kingdom contented and 
prosperous. 



A VIEW OF A CENTURY 5 

His means of doing this was by successful wars abroad 
and by a policy of "blood and iron" at home. Thus he 
came to be known as the "iron chancellor." He attacked 
Denmark, with aid of Austria, because the Danes had 
violated a promise in regard to the province of Schleswig 
by adding it to their kingdom. Successful In the attack 
Bismarck welcomed the quarrel that followed with 
Austria over the spoils. It then took only seven weeks 
for Prussia to crush Austria, which made her the undis- 
puted head of the German states. Bismarck next turned 
towards France, but in this direction he had to play his 
game more carefuUy. He first had to make sure that 
France had no friends among the nations, and it must 
appear to the world that it was France who wanted the 
war and not Prussia. Every opportunity fell nicely into 
Bismarck's lap and he made the most of them all without 
caring a fig whether he was acting honestly or not. Thus 
it happened that the Spaniards offered their vacant throne 
to a Prussian prince but France did not think it was safe 
for her to have him accept it. About the matter the King 
of Prussia, who was away from Berlin, sent Bismarck a 
telegram which was the report of his conversation with 
the French ambassador in which the dispute was accepted 
as settled. 

This report was the famous Ems telegram. Bismarck 
took the king's words, and by leaving out some here and 
there, made it appear that the meeting between the Prus- 
sian king and the French ambassador had been anything 
but pleasant, and that the behavior of each had been an 



6 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

insult to the other's country. When the telegram was 
published as Bismarck changed it, both France and 
Prussia were enraged, the former immediately declaring 
war. This was exactly what Bismarck wanted, and in less 
than six months the gallant but unprepared French armies 
were defeated ; and with all the sovereigns of the German 
states gathered in the famous Hall of Mirrors in the 
Palace of Versailles, outside of Paris, the King of Prussia 
was proclaimed emperor of the newly created German 
empire. 

This youthful empire, the latest and last to be born 
among the nations, was a giant at its birth, and that birth 
was the result, as you have seen, of an autocratic rule that 
was perfect. To safeguard what he had founded Bis- 
marck created alliances, or agreements, with Austria and 
Italy. Bismarck was now content; Germany was the 
most powerful nation in Europe, and he cared little, so 
long as this was so, what the other countries did outside of 
Europe. He was growing to be an old man now, but the 
empire was lusty with youth and the ambitions of youth. 
William I, the first German emperor, died, his son Fred- 
erick succeeded to the imperial throne but only reigned 
three months when he too died, and his son William II 
became the German emperor. 

William II was a very ambitious and aggressive young 
man. He represented the aspirations of a new Germany. 
He had scarcely been on the throne two years when he 
quarreled with Bismarck and virtually dismissed him from 
office. Under this clever but not very profound ruler 



A VIEW OF A CENTURY 7 

Germany began to have dreams of a greatness beyond any 
that Bismarck had ever beHeved in or wished for; it was as 
if the emperor said, "Continental supremacy is very fine, 
and makes us respected and feared, but it does not shed 
uj)on my people the glory of a world empire. There is 
England with her dominions on which the sun never sets, 
and France with vast colonies across the seas which enrich 
her people. See how they rule and are mighty, not merely 
in the eyes of a continent, but the whole wor-ld ! God has 
appointed me to take the great heritage of the German 
empire and go forth and overcome those nations and rule 
the world so that it may benefit by the superior civilization 
of the German people. We are a mighty race and will 
triumph." 

If the Kaiser, as the German emperor was called, did 
not use these very words, they were in truth the substance 
of his thoughts, and he expressed them in words that were 
often more pointed and violent. His speeches, and he was 
very fond of making speeches on every occasion that pre- 
sented itself, were continually boastful and defiant. 
Moreover all the greatest men in Germany in every walk 
of professional life, from the army to the schoolroom, be- 
gan to imitate the emperor, and to boast about the might 
of the German race, of the superior civilization of the Ger- 
man people, and the fact that they were ordained by 
heaven to lead the nations of the world. 

At first the other nations looked upon the German 
emperor as a vainglorious character, and a little unsound 
in mind; and upon the boasting and threats of the army 



8 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

officers, professors, merchants and preachers as sign of 
their desire to flatter and please their ruler. But all the 
while a few thinking men in other countries like France 
and England began to note the actions rather than the 
words of the German people. They noticed how their 
trade grew in foreign countries and the methods by which 
it grew. They noticed how the German army was grow- 
ing more powerful and efficient year after year because of 
the laws that were passed in the German Reichstag; they 
noticed how Germany had a growing tendency to meddle 
in the foreign affairs of other nations, and how generally 
in the settlement she would want a bit of land in Africa 
or Asia as the price of her agreement, and this con\anced 
them that she wanted to build a colonial empire; they 
noticed that she was gradually creeping through the heart 
of Europe to the east, along the lines of a great railroad 
she had got Turkey to permit her to build which would 
give direct transportation from Berlin to the ancient and 
fabled city of Bagdad, — and a few in England noticed 
that she was building a great navy which could have, as 
far as the world could see, only one purpose, and that 
purpose the very building of this navy proclaimed — 
namely, to cripple the greatest navy in the world, which 
was England's, in case of battle, so that Germany would 
be as great as any nation on the sea. Then they knew that 
Germany was dangerous; not because she was successful 
in all these things, but on account of the use she planned 
to make of her success. 

So, with this growing suspicion of a dangerous G^r- 



A VIEW OF A CENTURY 9 

many, first Russia and France, then France and Eng- 
land, and finally England and Russia, made an agree- 
ment to help each other in case either one of them was 
attacked by this threatening neighbor. Between these 
countries, France and Russia on the one hand, England 
and France, and again England and Russia, there had 
been for a long while feelings of distrust and rivalry. 
Yet they thought it best in a common defense of peace 
and security to forget and forgive all their past differences 
to protect themselves. So they stood opposed to that 
other alliance known as the Triple Alliance, of which Ger- 
many was the head. Germany, it must be confessed, 
thought very little of Russia, an autocratic government 
like herself, in relation to the combination of powers that 
stood ready to stop her mad course of conquest. It was 
the two great democracies, the free nations of France and 
England, that formed what was called the Entente 
Cordiale, that is a cordial understanding of what each 
country owed to the other in support and sympathy in 
time of trouble brought on by the undeserved attack of 
another nation, which Germany feared and wished to 
break up. She had on two occasions tried to do this and 
failed, in connection with the French claims in Morocco. 
Her other attempt was in a different field, in which her 
ally, Austria, took the leading part with Germany's sup- 
port. This was in the Balkans when Austria annexed the 
Slavic provinces of Bosnia and Herzegovina. On this 
occasion Germany triumphed in defying the Powers to 
interfere with her ally when breaking a promise; but it 



10 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

was a triumph that led to the ruin of war. From the 
moment this annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina by- 
Austria took place the Balkan States were a source of 
danger to the peace of Europe, and when on June 28, 
1914, Archduke Francis Ferdinand, heir to the Austrian 
throne, and his wife were assassinated by Gavrio Princip, 
a young Bosnian student, in the Bosnian capital of Sera- 
jevo, Germany seized upon it as the opportunity to pro- 
voke the war she had so long prepared for and looked for- 
ward to. 



CHAPTER II 

THE CHALLENGE OF THE GERMAN EMPIRE 

DO you know how old the British empire is and 
how it was built? Well, it was built upon the 
foundations of those great colonial possessions 
which were first added to the mother country, England, 
in the eighteenth century, — that is, nearly two hundred 
years ago. In winning great colonies all over the world 
England's wish was to give her people at home a chance 
to sell the merchandise they made. This is what we call 
foreign trade. England built a very large number of 
ships to carry the merchandise across the seas to be sold in 
the countries she ruled; and she also carried merchandise 
of other nations because she had more ships than they had 
for this purpose. The ships that carried on this ocean 
trade are known as the merchant marine. To protect 
them from pirates in the old days and from any inter- 
ruptions and harm that the enemies of England might 
do them, she built a great many powerful warships. That 
is how England's navy grew. And this you must remem- 
ber: Her navy was built to protect her colonial posses- 
sions, and the trade she carried on with these and with 
other nations. And this was necessary, because England 

is what is known as a manufacturing nation, that is, a 

11 



12 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

country in which most of the citizens work in making 
articles which are of use for our various needs. Where 
the greater number of a country's citizens work in fac- 
tories there are not enough to till the soil for the food 
necessary to feed the people. The food then has to be 
brought into the country. And that is the case with Eng- 
land. So England had to have a great navy not only to 
protect her many colonies that were far away in other 
parts of the world, like Canada and Australia and India 
and South Africa, but especially to make it safe for her 
people to trade with them and other nations, so they could 
have food. You can see then, that England kept the 
largest and most powerful navy in the world to protect 
her own existence by safely bringing food into the islands 
that make up the United Kingdoms of England, Scotland 
and Ireland, from lands across the seas. This navy never 
made a willful attack upon the ships or coasts of another 
nation. It was made the greatest navy in the world, for 
protection and defense. 

Now the German empire was only forty-three years 
old when the Great War began in 1914. The ruler of 
this youthful empire, Kaiser William II, who was also 
the King of Prussia, was jealous of the greatness and 
power of the British empire which was ruled by those 
little islands just across the North Sea and only a short 
distance from the coast of Germany. Indeed, most of the 
people of Germany, especially the Prussians who were 
the. strongest and the most warlike of all of them, were 
jealous of the English who had so successfully built and 



THE CHALLENGE OF GERMANY 13 

ruled the mighty British empire for nearly two hundred 
years. When the Kaiser as a young man came to the 
imperial throne he began to dream of a greatness for his 
country like that of England. And he went about mak- 
ing speeches in which he said that to win that greatness 
Germany, like England, must have a mighty fleet of war- 
ships. But he did not want these warships to protect the 
trade of Germany with foreign countries, which was grow- 
ing very large; nor to bring food into Germany to feed 
the people. He had a different aim than that. He hoped 
some day to be able to defeat the great British navy in 
battle, and take England's place as the greatest colonial 
power in the world. 

Let me explain to you how the German emperor and 
his people came to have this great but unhappy ambition. 
Before Prussia with the aid of the south German states, 
such as Bavaria, Wurtemburg, and Saxony, defeated 
France in the Franco-Prussian War of 1871, the .Ger- 
mans were an agricultural people; that is, they lived on 
the soil, producing the food that was needed to live by, 
and getting their merchandise from other countries, prin- 
cipally England and France. But in the settlement of 
the victorious war with France the Prussians took from 
her two provinces, Alsace and Lorraine, which were very 
rich in iron ore. This iron ore, added to what the Germans 
had in the new empire that was created right after the 
victory over France, gave them a larger quantity of this 
valuable material than any other country in Europe. 
Germany had besides a great deal of coal lying in the 



14 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

lands that she had at one time or another in the past taken 
from her neighbors. Coal and iron are the most necessary 
materials for manufacturing. And now being very rich 
in these the people of Germany began to leave the coun- 
tryside and the farms to enter into the fast growing cities 
and work in factories. 

The nation soon had more merchandise than the people 
could use, and the government encouraged the manufac- 
turers and merchants to sell the extra merchandise in for- 
eign countries. It was in this way that Germany first 
began to rival England. It began, as you see, with trade. 
And as the .Germans were very successful in this rivalry 
of outselling the English in their own markets, they began 
to believe themselves stronger and cleverer than the Eng- 
lish in every way. England was growing very old and 
weak, they thought, while the Germans were young and 
strong. They believed they ought to have great colonies, 
and that they could rule them better than the English. 
So they began to get colonies, but they were neither rich 
nor populous like the great British colonies ; nor, for that 
matter, like the French colonies — which also made the 
Germans envious. The colonies that the Germans wanted 
were either under the British or French flags. Especially 
those under the British flag, like Canada, Australia, and 
India and the South African Republics, were what the 
Germans most desired. But one immense fact stood be- 
tween this desire and its fulfillment — the powerful British 
navy. The Germans made up their minds then, that their 
only chance to become a great colonial empire was to get 



THE CHALLENGE OF GERMANY 15 

the British navy out of the way since it stood as a guardian, 
not only over the far scattered dominions of Great Britain, 
but over the lawful possessions of the other nations who 
were too weak in sea-power to protect themselves. And 
to get the British navy out of the way, Germany had first 
to build as many warships of every kind as those that 
floated the Union Jack. Then on some excuse she could 
challenge the British to fight. The outcome of this fight 
the Germans felt confident would be to their advantage. 
If she did not wholly destroy the British fleet, it would 
be so badly crippled in battle that its supremacy on the 
sea would be gone, and Germany could make demands 
that England would be obliged to heed out of fear. 

Now you must not believe that because the German 
emperor hinted, and very strongly too, and a great num- 
ber of his privileged subjects such as the rich business 
men, the learned professors, and the officers in the army 
spoke out plainly what they felt about England, that they 
did anything more direct to arouse England's suspicion 
or hatred. For after all, the Germans feared the Eng- 
lish. The English are a very easy-going people and 
generally pay no attention to what other nations may 
say about them. It is only when the lion's tail is twisted 
that he growls and bites; and it has to be twisted pretty 
hard for him to leap with all his might. The Germans 
were getting ready to twist the lion's tail, but they were 
going to make sure flrst that he had no claws and teeth 
when that time came. You will understand what I mean 
when I say the Germans wanted to make sure that the 



16 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

British lion had no friends when the time came to give his 
tail a hard and cruel wrench. They were not yet ready 
to do this because they had first to pull the teeth of France 
and cut off the claws of Russia, since these nations were, 
as you have been told, the friends of the British. 

So while the .Germans were building their great navy, 
which they hoped would one day be strong enough to 
fight and defeat the British navy, they were carrying out 
another purpose under the name of a society to which all 
the rich landowners of the country belonged, namely, to 
master and control all the nations of central Europe. This 
society was known as the Pan-Germanic. Through it the 
Germans intended to expand their commercial power over 
all the countries that reached through central Europe to 
Turkey and the East, down to the Persian Gulf in Asia. 
With Austria and Italy, as you have been told, the Ger- 
mans had made agreements which bound their military 
interests together in common, and it was easy for them 
with their superior strength, to take advantage of their 
friends. They had Austria completely under their in- 
fluence. The difficulty was with the small, troublesome 
states on the Balkan Peninsula, and Turkey. The Balkan 
states were all once a part of the Turkish empire in 
Europe, but little by little after much fighting and suffer- 
ing, and the help of the big Powers, they forced Turkey 
to grant them self-rule though owing her a certain 
allegiance. As most of the people in the Balkans were 
of the Slav race, Russia, whose people were Slav too, had 
a particular interest in their welfare. In Greece, of 



THE CHALLENGE OF GERMANY 17 

course, were the descendents of the ancient Greeks, while 
the Roumanians were Latin. 

The Pan-Germans sought and accomplished two 
things, to take the first step in achieving their ambitions. 
The first was to gain control of Turkey, because Turkey 
was the doorway to the east. The British had always 
found it necessary to exercise the strongest influence of 
any European power in Turkey, to make safe her water 
route to Asia and her empire of India. So the Germans 
had to get rid of the Sultan of Turkey's confidence in the 
British ; and this they did. This was helped greatly by the 
visit Kaiser William made to the Sultan when he promised 
to be the protector of him and his people. 

With the doorway to the east in their possession, the 
Germans had to command the pathway to the door, to 
succeed in their Pan-German scheme. That pathway lay 
across the Balkan States from Austria to Constantinople. 
This was the second of the two things to be accomplished. 

Now to accomplish this Germany set Austria to work 
to replace the control of Russia in the Balkans, as she had 
replaced the control of England in Turkey. So in 1908, 
Austria broke her pledge to the Great Powers, which she 
had made to them at the Congress of Berlin, and annexed 
Bosnia and Herzegovina to her empire. The people of 
these provinces were Slavs and kin to the people in Serbia, 
who hoped some day to be reunited. They had been taken 
from the control of Turkey who mistreated them badly, 
and placed under the care of Austria, when they should 
have been given to Serbia; if they had been, it would have 



18 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

saved a lot of trouble and suffering in the world. For this 
act of Austria, in annexing these provinces, inspired and 
supported by Germany, was the direct cause of the Great 
War. 

You see the Pan-Germans were behind these events 
that I have described. If they could control all of middle 
Europe to expand their business with the east, they would 
be daring enough to ask England why they should be 
excluded from having some control in the affairs of India 
and China. And since they would be safe on land where 
their armies could act, and England far away on the sea 
where she could not reach them, some agreement would 
have to be made that would weaken England in her own 
possessions and in the world. That was intended as the 
first blow against England, to destroy her prosperity and 
wreck her influence; the second would come when the 
German navy was prepared to fight the British navy. 

But in the meantime events happened which interfered 
with the German scheme. The Balkan States, tired of 
the long years of bad behavior towards them on the part 
of Turkey, joined together in a league created by the 
clever Greek statesman, Venizelos, and went to war 
against Turkey. The Turks were disastrously beaten, 
and all but driven out of Europe. This was not at all 
what Germany wanted, as a helpless Turkey and a union 
of strong, independent Balkan States, would ruin her Pan- 
jGerman ambitions. Her opportunity to offset this condi- 
tion of affairs, brought about by the defeat of Turkey, 
came when Bulgaria, dissatisfied with her share of the 



THE CHALLENGE OF GERMANY 19 

victor's spoils, attacked her former friends. It was an un- 
lucky attempt and she was defeated. Turkey took ad- 
vantage of her foes fighting among themselves, and stole 
back some of the territory they had won from her. Bul- 
garia in her defeat turned to Germany who showed her a 
great deal of sympathy. In this the Germans began to 
patch up their broken bridge across the Balkans, so neces- 
sary to their Pan-German ideals. But again the un- 
expected happened. Serbia had been wronged by Austria 
when she annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina, and was never 
forgiven. So when a young Serbian patriot shot the heir 
to the Austrian throne, Germany inspired the Austrian 
government to make such severe demands of the Serbian 
government, as a penalty for the crime, that if accepted 
they would not only humiliate that little nation before the 
world, but take away its independence. Germany knew 
all the while that no free nation could accept the terms 
demanded, and that Austria would be compelled to go to 
war with Serbia. They knew also that Russia would 
come to the aid of the weak little nation, which would 
force Germany to fight against Russia in keeping her 
agreement with her ally, Austria. All this Germany 
knew, and wanted, because she wished to settle for all time 
her mastery over her neighbors, and build that strong 
bridge across the Balkans, into the rich and dazzling east, 
for her merchants and traders. 

So the challenge went forth for the mighty contest of 
war, and the German people were riotously happy and 



20 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

confident — until England accepted the challenge too! 
They never thought she would do so at this time, and that 
made them angry, and hate the English as no nation had 
ever been hated by another nation. 



i 



CHAPTER III 

THE TEUTONIC ALLIES 

I AM going to tell how the nations declared war 
against each other in another chapter, but just now 
it is important that you should understand how and 
why the enemies were bound together that our Allies were 
compelled to fight. These enemies were allies too, since 
they took a side in common against us. It was like taking 
sides in a game of baseball, one set of players being op- 
posed to another. Only the game that these nations 
played was war. For Germany to win the game meant 
conquest, for France and England it meant liberty and 
freedom. So you see, this terrible game of war had a 
different meaning for each of the two sets of nations that 
were engaged. 

Now Germany and the other nations that were fight- 
ing with her for conquest were known as the Teutonic 
Allies. They were so named because the most powerful 
member of this group, who was the leader, belonged to 
the Teutonic race. Austria was also a member of the 
Teutonic race, at least partly so, for German Austria 
was Teutonic and a German Hapsburg was emperor of 
Austria and king of Hungary. But German Austria 
was small in numbers and the emperor ruled a great many 

21 



22 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

people of other races, such as the Czechs and Slovaks in 
Bohemia and Moravia, the Poles and Ukrainians in Ga- 
licia, the Italians in the Trentino and the Istrian Peninsula, 
the Slovenes in Carniola, the Serbo- Croats in Croatia- 
Slovonia and Bosnia-Herzegovina, and the Magyars of 
Hungary, who in their turn, under a German king, ruled 
the Roumanians in Transylvania. The other two nations 
that joined with these two Teutonic countries and their 
subject races to fight in the war were Turkey and Bul- 
garia. You ought to know, too, that these four nations 
were called the Teutonic Allies because they fought at 
the command of Germany, who ordered their campaigns, 
sent some of her best officers to lead their troops, gave 
them supplies of ammunition and equipment for their 
armies, and loaned them money to carry on the war. 

As nearly as we can make out, each of these four na- 
tions had a particular ambition to fulfill in winning the 
war. But that ambition was scarcely worth the suffering 
and the wealth they would have to pay to realize it. Ger- 
many's ambition was to become the absolute master of 
Europe, and then of the world, by destroying England's 
colonial power. Can you imagine a nation already rich 
and powerful, and already the strongest and most pro- 
gressive country on the continent of Europe, willing to risk 
sacrifice of all she had just because another country was a 
little richer? Yet that is just what Germany did. She 
played with destiny just as a gambler plays with money. 
She wanted to take what did not rightfully belong to her. 
And like some gamblers she was ready to cheat to succeed, 



THE TEUTONIC ALLIES 23 

and if caught at her cheating to use brute force to defend 
her spoils. That is exactly what she did, as you will learn 
in this book — only, for all her tremendous effort, she did 
not succeed. 

Austria's ambition was to be master of the Balkan 
Peninsula. Her empire was a crazy quilt of many races, 
which were troublesome enough to rule. But she wanted 
to add still more for the sake of increasing her own power 
and riches, and also because it would be a great and neces- 
sary help to Germany in her scheme to command a trade 
route to the east. Bulgaria's ambition was one of pure 
revenge against Serbia, and that revenge meant taking a 
lot of the latter's territory which would make Bulgaria 
the strongest of the Balkan States. Turkey's ambition 
was to make herself, with victory, secure among the na- 
tions and to be able confidently to rule her subject peoples, 
such as the Christians in Armenia, the Arabs in Arabia, 
the Syrians in Syria, and the Jews in Palestine; and to 
regain the ancient and historic country of Egypt which 
once was subject to the Sultan's power. Turkey had an- 
other ambition in the war which, however, the Turkish 
people did not want, but were forced into by their govern- 
ment under control of the Germans. This ambition was 
to see Russia so badly beaten that she would no longer 
have the strength to covet Constantinople, the Turk's cap- 
ital, and with it the command of the Dardanelles. For 
over a century the Russians wanted this city which would 
give them a warm water port all the year round for the 
export of their wheat and the import of merchandise. 



24 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

The Germans persuaded the Turks to join in the war and 
help make certain the defeat of Russia, so that this fear 
about the loss of Constantinople would pass away for- 
ever. 

These are the reasons why, for themselves, each of 
these nations fought on the side of Germany. In doing 
so they had the conviction, too, that Germany was going 
to win the war. Almost to the very end they were quite 
sure about it. Germany, for her part, cared very little 
why Austria and Turkey and Bulgaria entered the war 
on her side. Her own national reasons she regarded as 
the most important, and she looked upon the fighting of 
her allies as a necessary help in carrying out her 
ambitions. 

Though Austria, Turkey and Bulgaria believed for so 
long that .Germany was going to defeat her enemies in the 
west, it did not take them long to realize how selfish she 
was in looking out for her own interests first, — and that it 
was for her interests principally that her allies were fight- 
ing, and not their own. Germany did not conceal from 
them the fact that her soldiers were better than theirs, that 
her officers had considerably more talent than theirs, and 
that it was due to the planning of her great General Staff 
which enabled them to invade the enemies' countries. 
When there was a great campaign to be undertaken, the 
Germans not only planned it, but sent some of their best 
generals to direct it. That was why General von Mack- 
ensen led the Austrians who drove the Russians out of 
Galicia in the summer of 1915, and again later in the 



THE TEUTONIC ALLIES 25 

same year invaded and devastated Serbia; that was why 
General von Mackensen and General von Falkenhayn, 
both Germans, with Austro-German troops, turned 
Roumania's short-lived victory into disastrous defeat and 
overran the country. Another German general, Liman 
von Sanders, led the Turks against the English in 
Mesopotamia and Palestine. 

The Germans all but despised their allies because 
without her help they were nearly always defeated. They 
did not help her to win, but merely to prolong the war. 
As things were it would have pleased the Germans very 
much if they could have won with such weak comrades, 
because then they would have been her vassals in carrying 
out her Pan-German schemes. Against all right and 
reason she dragged these countries into a terrible war, 
and it was their weakness that eventually affected her own 
chances of victory. 



CHAPTER IV 

THE STOEY OF THE DECLARATIONS OF WAR 

THIS is how war was declared. The Austrian 
government dehvered an ultimatum, that is a 
final demand, to the Serbian government, on 
July 23, 1914, giving Serbia forty-eight hours in which 
to reply. Serbia immediately asked the advice of her 
friends who counseled her to accept all the conditions 
but one, which would take away her freedom. This Serbia 
did, but since the demands were not agreed to completely, 
Austria found the reply unsatisfactory, and on July 28, 
declared war against Serbia, and began hostilities. 

As soon as Russia, England and France knew of the 
ultimatum, they began very earnestly to have the quarrel 
between Austria and Serbia settled without war; Russia 
asking Austria to give Serbia a longer time in which to 
answer the ultimatum, and England appealing to Ger- 
many to use her influence with Austria to act in such a 
way as to keep other nations out of the quarrel. She also 
beseeched Germany herself to do nothing as Austria's ally 
that would provoke other nations to take Serbia's side in 
the war, but rather to help England in keeping the war 
confined to Austria and Serbia alone. All these efforts, 
however, were of no avail. Germany, while she pretended 

26 



THE DECLARATIONS OF WAR 27 

to help keep the war from spreading, did not help. In- 
stead she took every act or good intention of Serbia's chief 
friend, Russia, as a threat against herself. And behaving 
much as Bismarck behaved at the time of the Franco- 
Prussian conflict, that is dishonestly and deceitfully, the 
Kaiser declared war against Russia. 

Well, at last the Kaiser had drawn the sword. He told 
his people that it was thrust into his hands by his enemies. 
He did not ask the people if they wanted war, because he 
had taught them to believe that it was his personal right 
to declare war and make peace. Germany went to war 
with Russia on August 1, 1914. 

Having declared war against Russia, Germany knew 
that sooner or later France, because of her agreement to 
befriend Russia when attacked, would come to the latter's 
aid. It was therefore to Germany's advantage to start 
hostilities before France was ready. So Germany made 
a charge, which she knew was false, that some French 
aviators had crossed the frontier and dropped bombs on 
German towns. This charge was inmiediately followed 
by a declaration of war against France. 

How false was this charge may be seen in the fact 
that, though Germany declared war against Russia first, 
it wus along the French frontier that Gei'many had placed 
hundreds of thousands of troops many days before even 
Austria had declared war against Serbia. 

France was now again at war with Germany after 
forty-four years, and while the people were brave and full 
of determination to meet the enemy, they were sad and 



28 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

hopeless. They could scarcely know then, as all the 
world has known since, that on August 8, 1914, was to 
begin the most glorious of all the glorious periods in the 
history of France. But what made the French people so 
sad and hopeless was the fact that they did not know what 
England was going to do in the crisis. England, it was 
true, had an agreement with France, just as Russia had, 
but what her action would be no one knew. England re- 
served her right of action, as she told Germany when that 
country basely tried to bribe her to stay neutral, and she 
told the same thing to France when it seemed certain that 
Russia would cause the French to be pulled into the war. 

Germany herself, however, decided the question 
whether or no England would take part in the war. It 
was not Germany's intention to have England against 
her; as a matter of fact she did not believe that England 
would join her enemies. The German statesmen and sol- 
diers who could believe that, in light of what they did, 
were very unwise. Men without honor cannot see honor 
in other men. And the Germans were foolish enough to 
think that England cared too much for peace and safety 
and prosperity to let an ideal like honor, which had only 
a moral value, destroy them. Having lost all sense of it 
themselves, they could not believe that it was worth more 
to some men than life itself. It was a costly mistake they 
made, that followed them with vengeance all through the 
war. 

When Belgium became an independent kingdom, her 
neutrality was guaranteed by England, France and 



THE DECLARATIONS OF WAR 29 

Prussia, that is to say, either or all of these nations would 
defend Belgium against the attack of an enemy. Belgium 
on her part promised to be neutral in case any of these 
three countries were at war with each other. If Belgium 
was too small to defend herself, it was quite out of the 
question to think she would attack any of her powerful 
neighbors. Her neutrality consisted then, in not granting 
the permission to any of the Great Powers to use her terri- 
tory for the passage of troops to attack another nation. 

Yet this is what Germany, who had given her word to 
Belgium to protect her, asked to do. She asked the Bel- 
gian government to let her send troops across Belgian 
soil to attack France. And King Albert, in the name of 
his people, refused. 

England had asked both France and Germany when 
events looked threatening, if they were ready, in case of 
war, to stand by their pledges and respect the neutrality 
of Belgium. France at once informed England that she 
would keep her obligation towards the little nation; Ger- 
many evaded the question. When King Albert told Eng- 
land of Germany's demand for a passage for her troops 
across Belgian soil, the English sent an ultimatum to 
German j^ asking again if she meant to keep her obliga- 
tion, and demanded an answer in twenty-four hours. In- 
stead of answering the English, the Germans, having King 
Albert's refusal to let their troops pass, declared war 
against Belgium, and on the same day sent an army 
across the frontier and began the invasion of the country. 
This was on August 4, 1914. England waited until mid- 



30 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

night on the same day, and receiving no reply to her 
ultimatum, declared war against Germany. 

England was now in the balance against Germany, 
and her declaration of war had two very great effects. 
One was on France, where a thrill of joy went through the 
whole country, and lifted the gloom that hung over every 
Frenchman's heart. The other was on Germany, where it 
awakened a passion of anger that filled every German's 
heart with hate. When the English ambassador called on 
the German chancellor before leaving Berlin, the latter 
told him in a rage that it was unbelievable that England 
should declare war on Germany "just for a scrap of 
paper." 

That remark, more than any deed afterwards com- 
mitted by the German army, revealed the thoroughly un- 
principled character of the German government. 

This act of invading little Belgium whom Germany 
had given her pledge to protect and defend, shocked the 
entire world. Within a week from the time that Austria 
began the war against Serbia, the world knew that it was 
to be fought for something more serious and vital than 
the punishment of a small nation for somehow having had 
part in a political crime. Germany's behavior had, as 
you might say, let the cat out of the bag. She at once 
told the world there was nothing sacred but might, and 
that she was bound only to "the necessity that knows no 
law." It was a pretty plain way of saying, "We, the Ger- 
mans, mean to rule the world." 

But England stepped right in the path of the bully 



THE DECLARATIONS OF WAR 31 

and said, "You are wrong. Honor and duty and respect 
for the rights of others are more sacred than might. For 
they are the virtues of the soul which is given us from God, 
while might is merely the gift of the body, and is material, 
and will perish. England is proud to sacrifice all her 
material possessions so that civilization may keep its faith 
in the virtues of the soul." 

The war, then, as every one knew, became a war for 
faith and honor and duty, which meant the liberty of na- 
tions and the freedom of mankind. 

This conviction grew stronger and stronger among the 
nations as the cruel and barbarous acts of the German 
army in Belgium became known to the world, and the na- 
tions began to take sides against Germany. The friends 
she might have had were lost when she told the world that 
"necessity knows no law." The nations knew by this time 
that her "necessity" was to conquer and rule. And if it 
so happened that any of them stood in her way, as did 
innocent little Belgium, they too would be treated in the 
same cruel manner. So to protect themselves they had 
to declare war against her, or break off what is called 
"diplomatic relations," that is have no dealings with her, 
calling home their representatives from Berlin and send- 
ing home the German ambassadors in their own capitals. 

All these declarations of war against Germany and 
the severing of relations did not take place at once. They 
went on for nearly four years, because Germany was very 
hard to defeat. Up to the very last year of the war it 
seemed as if Germany might win. She had taken the 



32 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

world by surprise, and after forty-four years of prepara- 
tion in the science of warfare, down to the very least detail, 
the advantage she had was terribly difficult to overcome. 
But with twenty-four nations at war with her and her 
three allies, the outcome could not have been other than it 
proved; the question was how long the world would have 
to suffer the agony and destruction of conflict before right 
would triumph. 

France was the first nation to declare war against 
Germany and was followed in the next four days by 
Belgium, England, Serbia and Russia. Two days after 
Russia, Montenegro declared war, and before the year 
1914 ended Japan joined with these nations against Ger- 
many. 

In 1916, Portugal and Italy declared war. 

In 1917, the number of Germany's enemies doubled, 
as the following nations in order, made declarations of 
war: the United States, Cuba, Panama, Greece, Siam, 
Liberia and China. 

The following year, 1918, and the fourth year of the 
war, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Haiti, Honduras 
and Brazil, increased the number of combatants against 
the Germans to twenty-two. 

Some of these twenty-two nations declared war also 
against all of the other Teutonic Allies, Austria, Turkey 
and Bulgaria, while some only against Austria, such as 
the United States, and others still, only against Turkey 
or Bulgaria. 

Altogether there were twenty-eight nations engaged 




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THE DECLARATIONS OF WAR 33 

in the war. Roumania and the little nation of San Marino, 
though fighting in the same cause as England, France and 
Russia and their Allies, declared war only against Austria. 
Can you imagine what this meant if we consider 
figures? It meant that 1,575,135,000 inhabitants of the 
world were at war, and that thirty millions of these were 
in the armies at the front. It staggers belief. No wonder 
it was called the World Warl 



PART II 
THE EMBATTLED NATIONS 



CHAPTER I 

THE STORY OF BELGIUM 

I AM going to tell you very briefly the story of the 
nations that were at war with Germany. This is 
not to be an account of their battles at the front, 
those we shall follow in other chapters, but of the battles 
at home which were quite as important in achieving 
victory. 

Unlike all previous wars, the World War was not 
merel}^ a battle of armies, but a battle of nations. You 
have, no doubt, very often heard the word morale. You 
have heard it said that the morale of the troops was splen- 
did, or that the morale of the nation was broken. Well, 
this word morale describes the state of mind in which the 
soldier fights, or the state of mind in which the nation 
works to sustain and support its armies in the field. 

This state of mind in the soldier or the nation is af- 
fected by the spirit. That is to say, if the soldier is well- 
fed, well-clothed and equipped, and is confident of victory, 
he goes into battle with such a strong and determined 
spirit that his mind is clear and alert and he feels uncon- 
querable. When an army is like this, its morale is good. 
But when an army is hungry, or ill-clothed, or badly led 

by its oflicers, or has been repeatedly defeated, and it goes 

37 



38 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

into battle with a reluctant and depressed spirit, the minds 
of the soldiers are confused and nervous and the morale is 
bad. One of the chief things that the generals on both 
sides in the Great War tried to do was to break the 
enemy's morale. In that way lay victory. 

And back of the army's morale was the nation's 
morale which was very necessary to keep the army going 
in such a long and wearisome conflict as the World War. 
The nation's morale, it is true, was affected by the progress 
of the armies in their campaigns, but should these armies 
suffer a prolonged series of defeats, this was not always 
enough to break it. Defeats often stimulated the nation 
to greater exertion in giving the armies fresh confidence 
in their efforts. This was quite true of England and 
France in the course of the war. The morale of the people 
in these countries was bad on two or three occasions, dur- 
ing the first three years of the war but it was never broken. 
Had that been so, the war would have been lost. 

In the World War, as I have said, not armies but na- 
tions were in conflict. And what happened at home was 
quite as important in winning victory as what happened 
on the battlefields. The morale of the people was deeply 
affected by what they experienced in sustaining the armies, 
by the sacrifices they made in everything that touched 
their daily life, tlii'ough their grief for the dead, through 
the small quantities of food they had to be satisfied with, 
through the comforts and luxuries they were compelled 
to deny themselves, the freedom of speech and action it 
was necessary to renounce, the hard and many labors they 



THE STORY OF BELGIUM 39 

had to perform, and a hundred other vital but unac- 
customed things which the war brought to their very 
hearthsides. The spirit of everybody was tried very sorely, 
and it was the strength of this spirit in the nation as a 
whole that decided whether the war would be lost or 
won. 

How did the people behave under their sufferings and 
sacrifices and labors, in each of the Allied nations? That 
is what we want to know. It is true that all of them acted 
with a great deal of heroism. But as each race was differ- 
ent in temperament, the character of the heroism had a 
different expression and interest. I am going to tell you 
about the Belgian people first because it was their fate 
to endure with glorious heroism the agonies of a war for 
which they were not responsible, and indeed had been as- 
sured would never be their lot to experience. 

For this reason we call Belgium "The Martyred Na- 
tion." When a man suffers and dies for his faith and con- 
victions, such as the early believers in the Christian re- 
ligion, he is regarded as a martyr. He has been willing 
to sacrifice everything, even life, for what he believes to 
be true. That is what Belgium did. The Belgian people 
had the absolute conviction that it was not right for them 
to consent to the passage of the German troops across their 
country to attack France with whom they lived on friendly 
terms. And this conviction they backed with all the 
military strength they possessed. It was the hope of Eng- 
land and France to send soldiers to help the little Belgian 
army before the Germans had advanced very far into 



40 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

King Albert's country. But the Germans had swept 
clean across Belgium, to within a few miles of France, at 
a place called Mons, before a small British army under 
Sir John French came with help. The brave thing about 
the Belgians is, that they never waited for help. They 
went right to their frontier, to the fortress city of Liege, to 
meet the Germans in battle for the defense of their coun- 
try and their honor. 

Of course the Germans greatly outnumbered this gal- 
lant little Belgian army. Though Liege was considered a 
very strong fortress, and hard to take, it fell before the 
great siege guns of the enemy which were fired from a 
greater distance than the guns of the fortress could reach. 
From this place, right across Belgium, the Germans drove 
the Belgian army, and the British and the French too, 
when they came up to fight the invaders. 

The great German General Staff had planned the 
passage through Belgium in so many days. In the first 
place it did not suppose that the Belgians would have the 
courage to oppose the Kaiser's army, and in the second, 
it was convinced that if they did, the powerful troops of 
the empire would defeat the Belgians very rapidly and 
pass on. The Germans, as well as the rest of the world, 
were very much surprised when the heroic little army of 
Belgium delayed the enemy from across the Rhine many 
days, and thoroughly upset their plans to get into France 
and capture Paris within six weeks. 

You have heard of the defense of the narrow pass of 
Thermopylas in ancient Greece, where a handful of 



THE STORY OF BELGIUM 41 

Spartans under Leonidas held back the Persian host 
under Xerxes, and saved Greece from the Asiatic con- 
queror. Well, that is what the Belgians did in those 
August days in 1914, they held the pass of Thermopylse 
against the Germans for the freedom of our civilization. 
They did this by fighting so bravely that the Germans had 
to take more time than they could spare to defeat them, 
and this gave the AUies time to make their plans and 
prepare for the glorious and triumphant Battle of the 
Marne, which you shall hear about. 

The Germans grew very angry when they realized 
what the little Belgian army had done to their plan of 
campaign. They would teach them a lesson, they said, 
so that neither they, nor any other country, would dare 
stand in their way. And so the people, the innocent old 
men and women and children, were made to suffer un- 
speakable misery and death, just because their sons and 
husbands and brothers had been brave and staunch in 
battle against the enemy. The helpless citizens of Bel- 
gium had to pay the price of their soldiers' heroism. But 
they were no less heroic than their kin on the battlefield 
in what they had to endure, as you shall see. What 
cowards and brutes the Germans were to take their 
revenge in the manner they did! No sooner had they 
taken Liege, and moved on through the towns and cities 
of the country, then they began to pillage and burn them, 
holding hostages, hanging and shooting citizens, and im- 
posing heavy fines in money for the least protest or act the 
people made in defense of their rights in war. The Ger- 



42 THE STORY OF THE GRExVT WAR 

man officers regarded such protests as a violation of their 
authority. And the acts the Germans committed were 
against all the rules of warfare as conducted by civilized 
nations ; they were cruel and barbarous to the extreme. 

Julius Cgesar, the Roman conqueror, in writing about 
his cami)aigns in Gaul, which two thousand years ago was 
that part of Europe extending from the Pyrenees to the 
Rhine, said — "Horum omnium fortissimi sunt Belgge." 
These words in our language mean, that "Of all, the 
bravest are the Belgians." Cgesar, the mighty Roman 
conqueror, was recording from his own experience, for 
the world of his day, and afterwards, to know that the 
Belgians were the bravest fighters he had met in battle. 
The Germans found this to be as true in August, 1914, 
as Caesar did in the years 58-50 B. C. when his Roman 
legions conquered ,Gaul. 

But surely no victor has proved less generous towards 
their foes than the Germans. After an army had been 
defeated it does little good to destroy cities and enslave 
the people, and to murder them and take away their 
means of livelihood. An enemy may hope to break the 
spirit of a people by doing these things, as the Germans 
thought they were doing; but the spirit of a people is very 
much harder to destroy than cities. 

So, when the Kaiser's troops sacked the city of 
Louvain with its university and famous library, Namur, 
Dinant, Givet, Malines, Aerschot, Termonde and many 
other places including Ypres with its wonderful Town 
Hall ; and when they shot hundreds and hundreds of help- 



THE STORY OF BELGIUM 43 

less and innocent citizens, and sent thousands of men, 
women and young girls back into Germany to work in 
the munitions factories and on the farms; and when they 
stole millions of dollars' worth of machinery from the 
Belgian factories, and tools from the farms, and furniture 
from the houses and sent them back into Germany too, 
for their own use, they thought surely these miserable 
Belgians would ask for mercy, and would be willing to 
do everything they were told, to help the German army 
defeat the enemy, among whom was the Belgians' own 
king. But the Belgians would do nothing of the kind. 

Though starving and poorly clothed in thin and ragged 
garments, without work, eternally watched, arrested and 
put in prison for the most innocent offenses, and made to 
wait on the German officers as if they were slaves, the Bel- 
gian people never ceased to wait and hope for deliverance 
from the brutal and tyrannic conqueror. All through the 
German occupation of the country they published a 
paper called Libi'e Beige, that is, Free Belgium, de- 
nouncing the brutal rule of the oppressor. This paper 
circulated from hand to hand among the people, and 
though the Germans tried very hard to find out where and 
how it was published, they never succeeded in doing so. 

Among the many brave and noble men who worked 
and suffered for the Belgians were four whose deeds stand 
out above the rest. Two of these were Belgians and two 
Americans. They remained in the country laboring with 
the German governor and his officers, to see that the 
people got as much justice as possible. Of course, when 



44 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

America entered the war against Germany, the Ameri- 
cans had to leave. These four men were Cardinal Mercier, 
Archbishop of Malines, Burgomaster Max of Brussels, 
Herbert Hoover, the head of the American Commission 
for Belgian ReUef, and the Honorable Bl^and Whitlock, 
the American Minister at Brussels. I cannot begin to tell 
you what these noble men did to relieve the Belgians of 
their misery, and how in doing what they did they were 
driven to exasperation and despair, and subjected to per- 
sonal danger, in dealing with the brutal and untruthful 
German officials. 

Some of the people of Belgium when the Germans first 
invaded the country were able to escape and went to live 
in France and England. But the greater number who 
remained could do nothing but suffer and wait. If they 
could only have worked like the people in France, where 
the German armies had not reached, and in England, in 
the factories or on the farms for their armies, it would 
have helped them to bear their suffering. Instead they 
were forced to be idle at home, or were taken away from 
their homes and families into Germany where they were 
made to work very hard for the enemy. All about them 
their homes were in ruins. Everywhere was nothing but 
despair and pain. 

One of the greatest tragedies of the German occupa- 
tion of Belgium was the execution of Edith Cavell, an 
Englishwoman who had lived many years in Brussels 
training young Belgian girls to become nurses. This noble 
woman was accused of helping some Belgian men to es- 



THE STORY OF BELGIUM 45 

cape from the country. Her trial and execution formed 
one of the most revolting acts committed in the war. Edith 
Cavell has left a memory that the world will never forget. 

Yet neither their faith in God nor their love of country 
was lost. Though the nation as one voice cried, "O Lord, 
how long, how long?" this faith in God and love of coun- 
try kept their spirits free. The great Cardinal Mercier 
said, "Our country is not a mere concourse of persons or 
of families inhabiting the same soil, but an association of 
living souls." And souls cannot be destroyed as you 
destroy the body. Which was very, very true of Belgium. 

There was a little bit of Belgium in the southwest 
corner below Nieuport and Dixmude, running from the 
seacoast to the French border, that the Germans were 
never able to take. Although the Belgian government 
moved its capital to Havre, France, after it had given up 
Brussels and was driven out of Antwerp, King Albert 
and his little army held on to this small bit of their native 
land all through the war. The people, suffering as they 
were, took this as a good omen that God would some day 
give them back the rest of their beloved country. 

And this, as you know, was true. After more than four 
years of frightful suffering, with unbroken spirits and 
great rejoicings, the people welcomed back their King 
and Queen from exile, and before them lay crushed and 
helpless the once mighty and arrogant armies of the Ger- 
man empire. 



CHAPTER II 



THE STORY OF SERBIA 



THE little nation of Serbia was another victim of 
the war that was invaded and made to suffer like 
Belgium. But unlike Belgium, Serbia had a 
taste of victory over the enemy before her defeat and 
devastation. 

The story of the people of Serbia, however, is quite 
different from that of the Belgians in their heroism under 
defeat and invasion. This was due to the difference in 
character and temperament of the two peoples. 

Belgium, as you have often heard it said, was the 
"cockpit of Europe," that is to say, for several hundred 
years, it was in that country where so many of the great 
battles of Spain, Holland, France, England and Prussia 
were fought. The people of Belgium were not especially 
a warlike nation, and had nothing to do with these great 
and many battles that were fought on their soil. They 
are an industrious race, interested in art and literature for 
which many of them are famous. 

The Serbians are a peasant people, and have always 
been very warlike. They have also one of the finest folk 
or ballad literatures of all Europe. Long, long ago 
Serbia was a proud and independent kingdom under King 

46 



THE STORY OF SERBIA 47 

Stephen Dushan, and included all the territory that is 
now Bulgaria, ^lacedonia, Albania, Thessaly and north- 
ern Greece. Under Lazar I their independence was lost, 
for the Turks defeated this prince and his nobles in the 
Battle of Kossovo, in 1389. The Serbians were ruled by 
the Turks for several hundred years until early in the 
nineteenth century, when they began fighting to regain 
their independence. After many efforts they succeeded. 
The Serbians also had a great deal of trouble with their 
rulers, whom they sometimes elected, and at other times 
permitted to succeed to the throne in regular succession. 
The present ruler, King Peter Karageorgevitch, suc- 
ceeded to the throne in 1903, when King Alexander and 
Queen Draga were assassinated because their royal sym* 
pathies were favorable to the political interests of 
Austria. 

It was four months after Austria declared war against 
Serbia that she made a serious attempt to capture the 
Serbian capital, Belgrade, and invade the country. Every 
day, however, during this period, the Austrians bombarded 
Belgrade which was right across the river Danube that 
divided the two countries. The Austrians had tried, early 
in August, to enter the country from Bosnia to the west 
of Belgrade, but were completely defeated near a place 
called Semendra. They made no further attempt until 
December, when, after capturing Belgrade, they pushed 
south as far as the town of Valievo. Here the Serbians 
defeated the Austrians so badly that it was a humiliating 



48 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

disaster and rout for the invaders. The Serbs retook 
their capital, and awaited the next turn of events. 

They had to wait almost a year before their turn came 
to go the way that Belgium went, under the iron heel of 
the invader. Early in October, Austro-German troops 
under the command of General von Mackensen began the 
third invasion of the little country. The Serbs fought 
gallantly, but a few days after the battle began, Bulgaria 
declared war against Serbia, and attacked her in the rear. 
Early in December, exactly two months after the invasion, 
the armies of Austria, Germany and Bulgaria had driven 
the Serbs entirely out of their country. 

It was a pitiful sight, and a picture that is familiar to 
all of us, of the aged King Peter, drawn in an ordinary 
cart by oxen, dragging along the mountainous snow- 
covered roads and over perilous bridges, leading the 
broken fragments of his army out of his country, to take 
refuge among friends. This sorrowful old king went to 
Italy to live and brood over the memories of his former 
state, with a heart full of deep anguish for the plight and 
sufferings of his people. This was after the Serbian gov- 
ernment was driven from Scutari in Albania, which was 
captured by the Austrians in January, 1916. This same 
month the French had occupied the Greek Island of Corfu, 
in the Mediterranean Sea, where what was left of the Ser- 
bian army was taken and reorganized. 

Perhaps you do not know that a race of people who 
live close to the soil have a reserved and brooding nature. 
They have what we call fatalism, that is, an acceptance 



THE STORY OF SERBIA 49 

of fate whatever it is, and a belief that it cannot be changed. 
They suffer and rejoice aHke, with the same calm bearing. 
Especially do they seem to bear suffering of the intensest 
kind as a matter of course. There is no nervous expres- 
sion of deep feeling. Life is a series of hard, stern duties, 
and death a release from them, full of happy promises of 
rest and peace. The Serbians are a people of this kind. 
The heroism of such a people is in their stolid resist- 
ance to calamity. When the Austro-Germans and Bul- 
gars conquered Serbia and occupied the country, they pil- 
laged and burned towns and cities, and hanged and tor- 
tured the inhabitants who remained. Yet, unlike the Bel- 
gians, the Serbs showed no defiant disposition. There was 
no newspaper secretly published to keep alive the hope and 
spirit of freedom. They had no priest like the great Car- 
dinal Mercier to tell Austrian, German, or Bulgar gov- 
ernor that he was a tyrant acting against the justice of 
God and man, nor a municipal officer like Burgomaster 
Max who stuck to his post in the midst of dangers. You 
must not believe, that because of this, the Serbians are 
not a brave people. They are, indeed. Their history 
proves this. But as I have told you, they are as a nation 
a peasant race who silentty and stubbornly accepts the 
lot of fate. The physical agony they endured M^as quite 
as terrible as the Belgians', but it forced no cry to the lips 
nor awakened the mind in a beseeching self-pity to ,God 
or man. They starved to death with scarcely a murmur; 
badly clothed against the winter cold, they made no com- 
plaints ; they would stand with silent terror and misery in 



50 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

the eyes when made by the enemy to witness the execu- 
tion of their kin, and when the terrible epidemic of typhus 
fever ravaged the nation, they died like dumb and help- 
less animals. 

It was hard to tell during the terrible years before 
the tide of victory turned in favor of the Allies whether 
the spirit of these hardy people was broken or not. In 
the greater events of the war that took place, they were all 
but forgotten. Their aged king, almost blind, and 
crippled, was at Salonica in Greece, under protection of 
the Allied armies, while what remained of the Serbian 
army was being reorganized on the island of Corfu. 

"I believe," said King Peter of Serbia, "in the hberty 
of Serbia, as I believe in God. It was the dream of my 
youth. It was for that I fought throughout manhood. 
It has become the faith of the twilight of my life. I live 
only to see Serbia free. I pray that God may let me live 
until the day of redemption of my people. On that day 
I am ready to die, if the Lord wills. I have struggled a 
great deal in my life, and am tired, bruised and broken 
from it, but I will see, I shall see, this triumph. I shall 
not die before the victory of my country." 

And his hope came true. After a long rest, with new 
uniforms, and plenty of guns and ammunition, the Ser- 
bian army once more took the field against the Bulgarians. 
They fought as gallantly as ever. The Germans and Aus- 
trians had withdrawn most of their troops from Serbia, as 
they were badly needed against the French and British 
in France, and against the Italians in Italy. On Novem- 



THE STORY OF SERBIA 51 

ber 19, 1916, the Serbians, with the help of the British 
and French, recaptured Monastir, an important city at 
the extreme southern end of their country near the Greek 
border. Here, with the exception of minor advances to 
the north and east, they remained for many months. But 
on September 16, 1918, the AUied armies of Serbians, 
French, Enghsh, Itahans, and Greeks, under the com- 
mand of the French general, Franchet D'Esperey, ad- 
vanced on an eight j^-five mile front east of Monastir. In 
ten days the Bulgarians were so disastrously defeated 
that they asked for an armistice. 

The Serbians, like the Belgians, were once more re- 
stored to their country. They had fought and suffered 
and died, and had been driven out of their country like 
the Belgians, but not for the same reason nor with the 
same effect upon the world. The experience they had, 
while not so overwhelming and prolonged, had come to 
them a number of times in the course of their long history. 
They were happy to have their liberty again, but the pos- 
session lacked the thrill that made the Belgians mad with 

joy- 



CHAPTER III 

THE STORY OF FRANCE AND HER COLONIES 

GLORIOUS FRANCE! How can one tell her 
story as it ought to be told? How can one paint 
the suffering and the sacrifice, the heroism and 
the triumph of the French people in the Great War? 
What the French people became through the most perilous 
experience in their history, sent a thrill of admiration 
through the world quite as exultant as the thrill that came 
from victory in the Battle of the Marne, and the immortal 
defense of Verdun. The victory at the Marne was a 
miracle, men say, as was the determination which said 
"They shall not pass" at Verdun; and if this was so, then 
France herself was a miracle in the Great War. 

An American poet, Henry van Dyke, has sung that 
if you want to name Glory, "give me the name of France." 
And there is no one who will deny that all the luster in 
that word belongs to France. 

Now the history of France records other periods when 

glory shone from the nation. You will remember that 

the great Louis XIV was called the "Sun King" because 

he was a magnificent monarch who made France the 

mistress of Europe; and the great Napoleon Bonaparte 

whose name and deeds were like magic, before whom kings 

52 



THE STORY OF FRANCE 53 

bowed and nations paid fealty, created an empire that 
dazzled the world. Indeed France has been enthroned on 
a dazzling pinnacle of power more often than any other 
European nation, ever since the day when King Clovis, 
towards the end of the fifth century, made Paris his 
capital and ruled over the territory of all the Franks. 

A nation of great warriors, the French have not only 
been glorious in arms, but in things of the spirit, in law, 
in art and literature; but deeper than all is a national 
temperament which gives to all these a quality of elan, 
that is dash, impetuosity, ardor, which is irresistible. The 
most sensitive of all peoples, the French respond to in- 
fluences very quickly; but their mind, which is the most 
logical of any people's, and their wit, which has the most 
point, soon puts them in a sane and balanced mood. 

More different in traits of character and habit than 
almost any nation in Europe, the French people are of 
one mind and soul in the things of life that are the most 
worth while. The most important of these are the ideals 
of Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity, the trinity of re- 
publicanism which was born out of the storm and anguish 
of the French Revolution. Breton, Norman, Picardian, 
Gascon, Basque, Proven9al, whatever they are at root, 
they are all Frenchmen united as one people when their 
national ideals are threatened. 

These ideals were threatened as never before when 
the Germans attacked France in the summer of 1914, and 
the Chamber of Deputies, representing the people, imme- 
diately declared a Sacre Unite. That is to say, the nation 



54 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

formed a sacred union of all the people, setting aside its 
domestic quarrels and differences, in defense of the na- 
tional ideals. It was very typical of the French to do 
this. It was to tell the world that France stood as one 
family in faith and defiance. 

The undying spirit of France flowed like a fiery pas- 
sion in the blood of the nation. The first sign of it was, 
as I have said, that simple but earnest statement of a 
sacred union of all the people to defend their ideals. 
But the height of this spirit was reached in the tragedy 
that every French man and woman was to know in the 
throes of a terrible war. 

This spirit was one which, crushed to the very depths 
of anguish and despair, would not acknowledge defeat. 
Out of those depths it rose like a wounded bird into the 
sunlight of triumph and victory. 

You will learn some day what a wonderful city is 
Paris, the capital of France. And you will hear it said 
by every one who is not a Frenchman, that Paris is 
France. There is good reason for that saying, because all 
that is great in France comes to us through Paris. It is 
the seat of the government, the center of literature and 
art and science, and every Frenchman with ambition goes 
to Paris to win success with the talents that God has 
given him. But Paris is no more France than New York 
is America or London is England. And it is very im- 
portant that you should remember this in understanding 
the spirit of the French people, and what they endured 
and achieved in the Great War. 



THE STORY OF FRANCE 55 

This beautiful city on the banks of the Seine in time of 
peace is the ideal of all France, and the whole nation 
gives its best talents to make it beautiful and famous. 
All France serves Paris and is judged by what Paris 
does. But in times of war Paris serves all France. She 
reflects the character and spirit of the French people. She 
drops the masquerade she wears in peace times and shows 
the shining countenance of the sober, thrifty, indomitable, 
heroic French nation. 

Because the world had judged France by Paris which 
was gay and frivolous, it was said that the French people 
were both weak and wicked, and that a severe war would 
send France to destruction and doom. The Germans be- 
lieved this very thoroughly, and that when their great 
armies rolled across the frontier and captured Paris, it 
would come to pass. And while the rest of the world 
hoped this was not so, they feared it might be true. For, 
you see, there were other nations besides the Germans 
who regarded all the people of France from what they 
knew of the frivolous and pleasure-loving citizens of Paris. 
So when, in spite of great disadvantages, France was not 
destroyed, but defended herself gallantly, the world mar- 
veled at the re-birth of the French people. They were 
not re-born, it was Paris alone that changed. Her gor- 
geous body that was built for pleasure and that tasted 
pleasure of every sort was filled with a new spirit. Paris 
that had always laughed now prayed; her eyes that had 
been filled with the care-free and dancing forms of life 
now beheld sorrows; but her whole figure was full of an 



56 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

heroic dignity. This is what the French people gave in 
spirit to Paris, and the world was astounded as at a 
miracle. 

What I have been trying to tell you about France is, 
that from time immemorial there is a life beneath the 
surface which comes to view and directs the destiny of 
the nation in every great crisis. It lies still in ordinary 
times as if it did not exist. But when it awakes, what 
heroism is displayed, what a thrill it sends through the 
world ! Roland and his horn, Joan of Arc and her visions 
were an expression of it in the past just as the Marseillaise 
throbbing from the throats of the French soldiers going 
over the top was an expression of its spirit in their hearts 
during the Great War. It is sometimes very hard for 
other nations to understand what this hidden life is. I 
do not know whether I can make you understand when 
I say it is devotion. Devotion to home and country which, 
with the French, has the fervor of holiness. The peoples 
of other nations love their homes and their country quite 
as deeply as the French do, but the French love of home 
and country has a quality of devotion that is very differ- 
ent. They not only have it, but show it. To a French- 
man home and country are one. When he fights to pro- 
tect them, he is fighting in a religious cause. War be- 
comes holy, wonders are performed. 

The wonders performed by the French people are far 
too many to be told in a single chapter. For many and 
many years poets, story- writers and historians will be tell- 
ing the glorious deeds of the French people; how the 



THE STORY OF FRANCE 57 

poilu, that is the common soldier, went to the front and 
gave all without a murmur, but with the love of France 
in his heart and the song of faith and victory on his lips, 
and how his kin at home without complaint at his ab- 
sence or loss gave all they had of soul and body to feed 
and arm him for battle; how in the midst of the coun- 
try's ruin, and the oppression of the enemy, they neither 
winced nor bowed, but silently and patiently waited for 
deliverance. 

All were alike in the time of trial and pain, rich and 
poor having but one thought — the salvation of France. 
It is told of a high-born French lady that when she was 
condoled with for the loss of her fourth son in battle, she 
replied: "Why do you pity me? Rather congratulate 
me that I had four sons to give to France." This was 
the spirit of the rich as well as the poor. 

The rich gave up their fine houses to the government 
where wounded soldiers might be tended with care and 
comfort, and ladies with their own delicate hands nursed 
their bruised and broken countrymen of every class. They 
went up to the line of battle to serve with the Red Cross, 
driving ambulances, and performing numberless deeds of 
mercy and tenderness. They went into the munitions fac- 
tory and on the farm with the sisters of the poor to work 
for the armies. There was no difference between them 
in their desire to do all in their power to help poor stricken 
France. They went about these duties with grief locked 
in their hearts for the loved ones who had been killed at 
the front. Only and for a time did the women of France 



58 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

show their grief in the outward forms of mourning. They 
regarded the sorrows that had come to them as national 
and not personal. And for the sake of the France they 
loved, it was hidden, hidden so the country could arise in 
all her strength unhampered by idle tears and needless 
regret. 

The men were giving life and limb in the trenches 
without complaint, and the women were not going to be 
less heroic in their battles at home. The undying spirit 
of France was in this determination to fight the war to 
victory. 



CHAPTER IV 

THE STORY OF GREAT BRITAIN AND HER COLONIES 

THE war brought to the people of Great Britain 
a different mood than it brought to the people 
of France, for their attitude was different. Al- 
though they were not attacked directly, they felt that it 
was only a question of time, should the Germans become 
victorious, before they would suffer the same kind of at- 
tack as France. They went into the war for a moral 
purpose, in defense of Belgium, which had been wrong- 
fully invaded, and fulfilled that purpose as a question of 
honor. While the French suffered the shock of the Ger- 
man armies, the British suffered their poisonous hatred. 
Of course, as the war went on, the English armies were 
made to feel the terrible power of Germany's military 
might. But the people of England, much as they were 
naturally concerned about the fortunes of their soldiers, 
were roused to indignation by the acts of the German 
government and its supporters, as well as by the barbarity 
of the German army in the field. Germany had little 
fear that the British army would be hard to deal with. 
What the Kaiser called "the contemptible little British 
army" which he met with in Belgium in late August, 1914, 
was but the forerunner of that immense British army 

59 



60 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

which the nation gathered and poured into France and 
Flanders during the next three years. What goaded 
the German hatred was the powerful navy which stood 
in the way of ultimate victory. Germany tried her best, 
by violating all the rules of warfare, to get at England 
behind the shield of this immense naval power ; and it was 
in this way that the war came to have a direct effect upon 
the people of Great Britain. 

The bombing of London and of other places by Zeppe- 
lins and airplanes, the bombardment of open towns on 
the east coast of England, the torpedoing and sinking of 
merchant and passenger ships by the German U-boats, 
brought the reality of the war more forcefully to the Brit- 
ish people than anything else. 

The mere killing of Englishmen or Irishmen or Scotch- 
men on the battlefields of France and Flanders was taken, 
as one might say, as a matter of course by the unemo- 
tional people of the British Isles; but they were filled with 
a mood entirely new and different when the innocent vic- 
tims of German frightfulness on land and sea were gath- 
ered in. This was a method of warfare altogether dif- 
ferent from what it was believed possible for a civilized 
nation to make. The people of Great Britain opened their 
eyes to a peril such as they had never known before. In 
its meaning it was quite the same as the peril which had 
come to France, but the people took it differently. They 
did so because the war was not on their own soil. But 
while it was not on their own soil, it was, in a sense, at 
their very doors on the sea. And, what was more, it some- 



THE STORY OF GREAT BRITAIN 61 

times crossed their doorway and struck England at her 

hearthside. 

For nearly a thousand years, you must remember, no 

foe had put foot in England. In the old days it was plain 
to see how this could never be with England in command 
of the ocean. England still commanded the ocean, but 
modern inventions had brought into use new engines of 
warfare which fought under the sea as well as in the air; 
and against these there had been no known and adequate 
defense. Though England's mighty navy stood guardian 
around the Island Kingdom, these new agents of destruc- 
tion could slip by them out of sight beneath the waves, 
and in the air above the clouds. So England was made 
to suffer in many ways that she did not think possible. 
Her fleet of merchantmen was reduced, and that meant 
scarcity of food for her people. Her cities, unprotected 
by fortifications, could be attacked at night by Zeppelins 
and innocent men, women and children killed, and prop- 
erty destroyed. All of this happened, as you know; and 
its effect upon the British was such as to bring out of 
them an entirely new expression of their national char- 
acter. 

The British, unlike any of the European nations, have 
a small regular army. In every war, being a free people, 
the government relied upon voluntary enlistment to make 
up its armies. The first deep effect upon Great Britain 
made by the war was the overthrow of this system and the 
resort to conscription. While it is true that every time 
London was raided by Zeppelins, or one of the seacoast 



62 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

towns was bombarded by German warships, men in anger 
and a spirit of revenge joined the colors in great numbers, 
they were not sufficient for the task that England had to 
accomplish. They were civilians, of course. A long 
course of military training was necessary to make them 
fit to fight the well-drilled and organized armies of Ger- 
many. The British government had a difficult time in 
making the people agree to conscription. The English- 
man loves his liberty of action, wants to make his own 
decisions as to what he shall do with his lawful rights of 
citizenship. In breaking his purpose to keep these rights, 
and forcing his own consent to give them into the keeping 
of the government through conscription, was the first 
sign of the realization of the British people of what con- 
fronted them in the war. 

Though the British people gave up their liberties, you 
must not think they did so with the same agreeable temper 
as the French. To do so was unlike the British way of 
doing things. The British are a stubborn people. You 
may regard this as a defect in their character, but it is 
also in a measure a quality of their glory. For a Briton 
to grumble in doing a thing is something of a joke. The 
more he grumbles, the harder he works, the harder he 
fights, the more willing he is to sacrifice everything. As 
a rule, he is slow to begin, but he never knows when to 
stop once he does begin. As a rule he shows no great 
emotion when he succeeds; on the other hand, he is abso- 
lutely blind to defeat, that is to say, when most people 
come to the end of their resources and courage and 



THE STORY OF GREAT BRITAIN 63 

strength and are willing to patch up a quarrel, the Briton 
is beginning in dead earnest to vanquish his foe. What- 
ever he does, he wants to do in his own way, and one of 
the most notable aspects of the British people at war was 
this spirit that they showed of trying, under restraint, to 
assert their individual rights. 

In contrast to the French people who leaped as one 
nation to defend themselves against the attack of an 
enemy, the British people had to be roused to action. Do 
not misunderstand me when I say this. The spirit of the 
British was as quick as that of any nation to do its duty, 
but it must be taken into consideration that this sense of 
duty was chivalrous, that is to say, the first thought of 
the people was in fighting another's cause, not their own. 
It took them some time to realize that this duty was vital 
and not a mere matter of honor ; but even then, strange as 
it may seem, the British acted no differently as a people 
when they knew that they were fighting for their very 
existence instead of fighting, as they thought, to save a 
small nation from extinction. 

You see, the British were quite willing to give all once 
they felt it was their duty, but for a long time they wanted 
to give all on their own terms and in their own way. 
Their statesmen could not lead them as the statesmen of 
France led the French by a mere expression of the needs 
and necessities of the situation ; the British statesmen had 
sometimes to cajole, sometimes to threaten, and some- 
times to coerce the people into doing what was necessary 
to win the war. The people did not take kindly to having 



64 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

their privileges interfered with. This was quite as true 
of one class as of another. The nobility objected to 
being overtaxed quite as much as the workman objected 
to having his quantity of beer reduced. Sometimes the 
government had to make compromises with the people to 
get their consent to make measures that were necessary to 
carry on the war successfully. 

In the past ten or fifteen years, the workingmen of 
England, through their trade unions, have become very 
powerful. They have representatives in Parliament and 
in the Cabinet. As a class they were against war, be- 
cause they felt that the burdens of war fell mostly upon 
their shoulders. Among them as well as among certain 
men of great intellect were a number of what were called 
"conscientious objectors." As such, they were far less 
bothersome than iat Men of intellect and position. 

Now what I have told you about the British as a peo- 
ple is not nearly so serious as it might be with other races, 
with the Russians, for instance, as you will come to learn, 
who brought their country to ruin because they were un- 
used to personal liberty and power; but behind the Brit- 
ish this contention for personal rights was traditional, that 
is to say, through the long and proud history of Great 
Britain the rights of the people were recognized through 
the freedom of speech and press. Behind it all, however, 
was a very solid and indomitable patriotism. In the end, 
they would always do what was wanted and what was 
right to protect and enhance the glory of the British em- 
pire, and that was what this spirit of the British people 



THE STORY OF GREAT BRITAIN 65 

rose to in the great war. In this war they experienced 
what no Briton had experienced in the course of hundreds 
of years of British history. Enghsh men, women, and 
children on Enghsh soil became the victims of a murderous 
enemy. English towns and cities, in their proud isola- 
tion, were reached and suffered destructive attack. The 
fair and gentle landscape of the English countryside was 
scarred by shot and shell. It was then that the British 
grit their teeth and made war. 

Great Britain raised an army that was the marvel of 
the world ; a civilian army. Her women went into muni- 
tion factories or on the farm, taking the places of the 
men who had gone to France. Men who were unfit for 
service did their "bit" in ways that it was unbelievable 
they could, or would ever be called upon to do. Into the 
shipyards they went to build ships to take the place of 
those that were fast being destroyed by submarines. Eng- 
land had to supply her Allies with coal and iron, and her 
men worked unceasingly to increase the output so she 
could have enough of both these materials for her own 
needs, which were enormous, and for the other countries 
who fought at her side; yet she went about this with a 
sort of grim humor. There was nothing of that wistful 
and visionary glow that shone from the spirit of the 
French, the spirit that had the radiance of faith and de- 
votion in it, a glory which drew the praise and admiration 
of the world. The British instead expressed themselves 
in a rough and somewhat indifferent manner. They were 
too determined to be much concerned about their deter- 



66 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

mination. There was nothing of the heroic in their hazard, 
it was merely a job to be done, and they were going to 
see the job through, take what it would. They saw no 
glory in the job and were quick to resent any admiration 
for successfully putting through "a dirty piece of busi- 
ness." They knew that their life as a nation was chang- 
ing; the foundations of their institutions, but not of their 
character, were shifting; and a people, as they are, op- 
posed to change, they made no outcry, because they felt 
a new order would be the best thing for "old England." 

The British empire is a confederation of self-govern- 
ing dominions, and crown colonies. This empire, so 
mighty on paper, was supposed in reality to be but a very 
loose structure. "It will fall to pieces at the first blow 
by a powerful enemy," thought the Germans ; but what I 
have told you about the people of the British Isles is also 
true of the people in England's great colonial possessions. 
Self-governing dependencies, they have come to the help 
of the mother country in their own way. Diverse as were 
the races, far away as they were from England, this em- 
pire which spread all over the world was knit together 
under Mother England as one people in fighting the 
enemy. The colonies sent their sons across the seven seas 
to Europe, Asia, and Africa to fight for England ; those 
who stayed at home, men and women both, gave of their 
labor and their wealth to save and preserve the empire. 
If Canada, like England, conscribed her citizens, and 
Australia and New Zealand refused to do so, it made 
no difference according to their populations, for they 



THE STORY OF GREAT BRITAIN 67 

made a hearty and willing sacrifice of their manhood. So 
it was that the far-severed peoples of Canada, Australia, 
India, New Zealand, and the South African Republics 
all poured their blood and treasure into the lap of Mother 

England that she might still be their nourisher and pro- 
tector. 



CHAPTER V 



THE STORY OF RUSSIA 



IT would be difficult for you to understand the story 
of Russia unless at the very start you were impressed 
with the fact that Russia was a thorough autocracy. 
You may have been a little puzzled why Russia was fight- 
ing side by side with such free countries as England and 
France. This I have already explained to you in earlier 
chapters. The Czar of the Russians was a despot, his 
government carried on very largely under his personal 
rule in spite of the fact that not so long ago he granted 
to the people a representative government in the Duma, 
which was supposed to have some resemblance to the 
British Parhament or the Congress of the United States. 
The Czar could not help being a despot, because all his 
ancestors had been, and they, as well as he, believed it 
was the way to keep the Russian empire together and 
make it powerful. In spite of this belief, the people of 
Russia, who besides the Russians themselves consisted of 
the Ukrainians or little Russians in the south near the 
Black Sea, the Poles in Poland, the Lithuanians, and the 
Finns in the north, were always troublesome, because they 
desired more and truer liberties than were granted them. 
The vast population of Russia are mostly peasants, who 

68 



THE STORY OE RUSSIA 69 

live an agricultural life; but among them are many men 
and women of great intellect and aspiring ambitions. 
With these, some of the nobility sympathized, and they 
were associated together in societies which from time to 
time attempted to overthrow the tyrannic government of 
the Czar. Russian history is full of revolutions and as- 
sassinations. Longer and more consistently than perhaps 
any other people in Europe, the oppressed inhabitants of 
Russia have struggled for their freedom. 

The Russian people welcomed the Great War as a 
means of helping them in their fight for freedom. They 
were thoroughly behind their government in this instance, 
because their government, they thought, was itself bat- 
tling in behalf of freedom and doing so in comradeship 
with the two freest countries in Europe. It doesn't really 
much matter that the Russian government itself had quite 
another purpose in view for which it was using milHons 
of its subjects. We cannot discredit the j)urpose of the 
Czar and his ministers for backing little Serbia in her 
quarrel with Austria ; but, on the other hand, it was purely 
for position and prestige among the other nations that 
the Czar led his people into the war. As you can well 
see, each had its own purpose in fighting, the government 
to keep its influence and prestige in the Balkans ; the peo- 
ple, in the hope of victory, to win more freedom at home. 
For it is true that after every war that Russia has fought 
in the last half century, the people have made demands 
for a fuller share in the government and more secure 
rights of citizenship. Sometimes the demand has been 



70 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

made peacefully, and sometimes through revolution, as 
happened after the Russo-Japanese War in 1905. At any 
rate, the Russian people went into the war with great 
hopes, only to have those hopes dashed, and maddened by 
their disappointment they brought on the ruin of the once 
mighty empire of the Czar. 

The first two years of the war the Russian armies 
fought magnificently and the people backed them with 
every sacrifice and devotion. As an agricultural people, 
the Russians were unable to supply themselves with muni- 
tions. This vast country in northeastern Europe and 
northern Asia was separated from her allies by both sea 
and land routes. Only a part of the year did she have a 
port in Europe that was clear of ice where ships could 
sail with arms. The port of Archangel on the White Sea 
was a long way from the Atlantic Ocean, from which her 
friends could reach her. The exit to the Mediterranean 
Sea was closed by the Turks at the Dardanelles. Russia, 
you see, for all her vast territory, her many, many millions 
of people, was at a great disadvantage in being out of con- 
tact with her allies. They needed her foodstuffs, her 
grains quite as much as she needed their arms and muni- 
tions, and all along the borders of the Black Sea were 
stored great quantities of wheat which could not be moved 
because there was no safe or open way to ship it overseas 
to England and France and Italy. 

Russia was well prepared, however, for war in 1914, 
providing the war was to be a short one. It was due to 
no blindness on the part of her statesmen that the war 



THE STORY OF RUSSIA 71 

outlasted the period for which she was prepared, for it 
was the behef of the statesmen and soldiers in all the 
belligerent countries with one exception that the war 
would be a short one. Lord Kitchener, the famous Brit- 
ish general and Secretary of War, predicted at the be- 
ginning that the war would last at least three years. 

It took the Russians less than two years to feel the 
effects of their distance from their allies and their hemmed- 
in position. Supplies for the army became exhausted and 
the soldiers were compelled to fight with empty guns, often 
without any guns at all, and no artillery preparation or 
aid. The soldiers were very poorly clothed and suffered 
greatly from the cold at the extreme northern end of the 
front and in the Carpathian Mountains. Of all the coun- 
tries at war Russia had the poorest railroad communica- 
tion and equipment, and these soon broke down. The de- 
plorable condition of the railroads made it impossible to 
take food up to the front and the troops had to go into 
battle hungry; nor could reenforcements be transferred 
with speed and secrecy from one part of the line to an- 
other, when and where they were most needed. 

The Russian soldier was both docile and brave, and 
in spite of such conditions the armies, under the command 
of Grand Duke Nicholas, fought with great courage and 
won many victories during the first two years of the war. 
The man power of the empire was enormous, far more 
than could be drilled and equipped and put into the field. 
Badly as the Russians had been treated by their ruler and 
the clique of government officials who were of the no- 



72 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

bility, they fought with a fanatic zeal for "Holy Russia," 
the land they loved. The Russian peasant is quite igno- 
rant but with an intensely religious temperament. In this 
mood and with his slow, brooding nature, he made, while 
kept under strict discipline, a stubborn and dangerous 
enemy. 

The government of Russia betrayed the armies and 
the people. There were members of the government who 
were pro-German and helped the enemy greatly by failing 
to supply the armies with their needs. The government 
also was fearful for its own power. It knew that if Rus- 
sia and her Allies won the war the people would demand 
a greater freedom and its tyrannic power would be over- 
thrown. So, when a series of defeats and disasters over- 
took the Russian armies and they were thrown out of 
Galicia and the Carpathian passes, when Warsaw was 
captured and Russian Poland was in the hands of the 
Germans, and a German army stood battering at the gates 
of Riga in the north on the road to Petrograd, the mili- 
tary power of the empire was broken. The Czar took per- 
sonal command of the armies, relieving Duke Nicholas, 
and for a while there was a firm but fitful stand made by 
the Russians many, many miles within their own frontiers, 
from Riga in to the north to Dubno near the Austrian 
border in the south. It was after this that Lord Kitchener, 
the British Secretary of State for War, started on a secret 
mission to Russia to help the Russians in their dilemma, 
and was lost with his entire staff at sea off the Orkney 
Islands at the north of Scotland. The ship he was on, 



THE STORY OF RUSSIA 73 

the Hampshire, some say struck a mine in a storm; but 
it has also been rumored that the Empress of Russia, who 
was intensely pro-German, informed the Germans of Lord 
Kitchener's mission, and that they sent a submarine to sink 
the ship he sailed on. The world, however, was astounded 
at the news of the disaster that overtook the famous 
British general and his staff. The loss no doubt had a 
great effect upon the Russian situation, because the wise 
and stern counsel of the British soldier might have saved 
the complete collapse of the Russian empire. 

The people of Russia soon learned that they had been 
betrayed and began to grumble very loudly against the 
Czar and his ministers. To still this dissatisfaction the 
Czar did a very foolish thing in suspending the sittings of 
the Duma. This was in March, 1917. No sooner did the 
Czar commit this foolish act when a revolution began at 
Petrograd, which overthrew the imperial government and 
forced the Czar to abdicate the throne. The revolutionary 
government that came into power was strongly in favor 
of continuing the war on the side of the Allies. The men 
who composed the revolutionary government were earnest 
patriots and had the welfare of Russia very much at heart. 
Along with their government, however, was created a 
Council of Workingmen and Soldiers who served in an 
executive capacity the interests of the army and the peo- 
ple. This council decided to direct all the affairs of the 
Russians. They were very much against the war and 
demanded peace. The men of the revolutionary govern- 
ment did not deal with this organization as firmly as they 



74 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

might have done. Discipline in the army had been de- 
stroyed, the soldiers demanding that they should by debate 
and vote plan the method and place of campaign. They 
demanded that there should be absolute equality among 
the officers and men, and the common soldiers refused 
to salute their officers. Nothing good could come out of 
this undisciplined and chaotic condition. The officials at 
Petrograd could not cope with it and were soon over- 
thrown by a counter-revolution which put into power men 
of unscrupulous ambitions who, under the guise of ob- 
taining for the people their full rights, were nothing more 
than the agents of Germany. Men like Lenine and Trot- 
sky, doing work for Germany, now ruled Russia and 
tumbled the once mighty empire into an abyss of ruin. 

They brought Russia, as you know, to accept a dis- 
graceful and subservient peace from Germany. Through 
this peace Germany had won a great victory in the east. 
Russia was helpless in the throes of anarchy, an anarchy 
that was kept alive by the Bolsheviki. If that were all, 
the world might have had only a very great sympathy and 
deep pity for the so-called Russian Republic. In the place 
of the mighty and populous empire were a number of 
governments, for Russia was broken up, the Ukraine and 
Finns and others declaring their separate independence 
and setting up republics. All this, however, caused great 
alarm to the Allied Nations, for it exposed them to the 
redoubled might of Germany's military power. Though 
Germany agreed under the terms of her peace with Rus- 
sia not to withdraw her troops from the eastern front and 



THE STORY OF RUSSIA 75 

send them to the western front, she immediately began 
to do so. So France and England had to face a greatly 
strengthened enemy, and all because the smoldering na- 
ture of the Russian people, so long suppressed with 
tyranny, had at the first taste of freedom fallen a victim 
to its own excesses. The people of Russia who were faith- 
ful to the ideals for which they had been fighting could 
neither help themselves nor be reached to be helped by 
their friends, the French and British. Torn, helpless, 
bleeding, Russia was left to her own fate and the mercy 
of Germany. 



CHAPTER VI 

THE STOEY OF ITALY 

THE Italian people, like the French, have won 
the admiration of the world for their heroism, 
both in battle and at home under circumstances 
that were very difficult. They did not enter the war 
until May 23, 1915, but their entry on the side of the 
Allies was an evidence of Germany's guilt in provoking 
war. You have been told of the Alliance between Italy 
and Germany and Austria in which the three nations 
agreed to fight together in a common defense. Under 
these terms Italy should have stood with her former allies 
in the Great War had she not known the secret intentions 
of the Teutonic empires to attack their neighbors. When 
Germany realized Italy's intention not to join her in an 
aggressive conflict, she did everything in her power to 
keep her neutral. The Italian people, however, knew 
that their interests were not safe in staying neutral. Italy 
had a grievance against Austria, who still held under her 
rule provinces which were largely inhabited by people of 
the Italian race. To liberate these people and reunite 
them with the kingdom was a passion of the Italians, so 
Italy entered the war with this purpose in view. She had 
to rely upon England and France, more particularly 

76 



THE STORY OF ITALY 77 

England, for some very vital necessities while carrying 
on the war. Italy has no coal or iron, and these are very 
essential for maunfacturing and military purposes. Only 
her northern provinces of Venetia and Lombardy were 
industrial. The rest of the kingdom, running like a leg 
with its foot resting on the blue Mediterranean, was a 
paradise of olive vineyards and art. Under her blue skies 
with laughing faces and singing lips, the Italian people 
lived with passionate dreams, hallowed by a thousand 
years of historical associations. One of their most vivid 
dreams was liberty. Liberty had been idealized for them 
by the romantic Garibaldi, the magnetic Mazzini, and the 
brilliant Cavour. 

The Italians are a people easily inflamed, and noth- 
ing inflames them so fiercely as their national hopes. For 
these they will sacrifice everything of their small store. 
They went into the war on the burning words that fell 
from the lips of their great poet, D'Annunzio, who went 
about exhorting them to deeds of valor and sacrifice. 
Nothing was more typical of the character of the Italian 
people than the career of this poet during the war. A 
lover of ease and luxury, a dreamer of fervent dreams, 
one who loved the earth and its pageantry of emotions, 
he, the man of middle age, became an aviator. Into the 
skies he soared, carrying his message of inspiration to the 
people and to the troops, to stand valiantly for Italy and 
her sacred traditions. He was typical of the Italian people 
because in a sense they, too, were breaking from their 
moorings ; they were on a venture as perilous in its way as 



78 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

the frail airplane which D'Annunzio balanced and drove 
at terrific speed through the skies. It might crash to 
earth at any moment and a great venture come to ruin. 
Beyond their bravery and passion, which no one could 
doubt, beyond the justice of their cause and the hope of 
redeeming their brothers under the Austrian yoke, the 
Italian people possessed none of the great necessities, as 
I have said, with which to make war against a strong 
enemy. This is true in the light of the one great disaster 
which overcame the armies and the nation when the Aus- 
trians and Germans together swept through to the rear of 
the troops on the Carso Plateau, pushing them back across 
the Venetian Plain, and almost captured Venice. This 
defeat all but demoralized the whole nation. Up to the 
time when it happened, the Italians had won by hard fight- 
ing in the mountains of the north and the high ridges of 
the east a steady, victorious advance. Underneath the 
emotions of the Italians was a hardy nature which en- 
abled them to endure battle in the most difficult moun- 
tainous places. Up the steep mountainsides they drew 
their artillery and supplies. Across deep ravines and wide 
valleys they established their battle lines, taking their posi- 
tions on cliffs and ledges where only the eagles make their 
home. A nation that has such soldiers as these intrepid 
fighters was difficult to defeat. For nearly two years the 
world asked what the Italians had accomplished. They 
scarcely knew or could realize what was done by the 
Italian armies until Gorizia was captured. The extent, 
then, of their victories was made plain, not by the amount 



THE STORY OF ITALY 79 

of ground that was taken or the number of men that were 
involved; but by the almost impassable difficulty of the 
battlefields. The fruits, however, of these victories soon 
tasted bitter to the nation. The Italian people as well 
as the armies along the Carso Plateau were betrayed, and 
by the poison of propaganda. It was an evidence of how 
easy it was to inflame the Italian nature. In the industrial 
regions of northern Italy, through Venetia and Lombardy, 
were serious troubles owing to the scarcity of food and 
employment among the people. The Germans flew over 
the Italian lines dropping pamphlets with the information 
that the government was shooting down the relatives of 
the soldiers. This so affected the soldiers, who at once 
believed these lies, that they left the battle-front to pro- 
tect their kin. It was but another one of Germany's dis- 
honest and unfair ways of winning her battles. When the 
Italians left their trenches on that part of the line to the 
east of Undine, all the Germans had to do was to walk 
through and attack the armies on the Carso Plateau from 
the rear in the south. It is well to remember this episode 
because the great disaster which then befell the Italian 
armies had a great effect upon the people. It brought 
forth one of the noblest feats of endurance of any nation 
in the war. It was soon learned by the soldiers that what 
the Germans had said about their kin being shot by the 
government was false; but it was too late, however, to 
prevent the tragedy that fell upon the nation. The people 
rallied as their soldiers rallied and stopped the invader 
before the gates of Venice. Their defeat unified the whole 



80 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

kingdom in its determination for victory. They rose above 
the disaster by sheer force of spirit, rich only in the faith 
of the Itahan cause, in the given promise to redeem from 
the Austrian yoke their brothers in the Trentino, Trieste, 
and the Istrian Peninsula. This they kept, and Italy, as 
you know, stands whole> free, and united for the. first time 
in her history. 



CHAPTER VII 



THE STORY OF ROUMANIA 




OUMANIA was the third of the small nations 
to be invaded and overcome by the German mili- 
tary machine. She declared war against Aus- 
tria at the request of Russia, and was betrayed by the 
Russians, who failed, or did not intend, to keep their 
promise of military aid. Roumania was one of the three 
Balkan states whose territory was very valuable to either 
side. Though she had a German king like Bulgaria, the 
Roumanians were of a Latin stock and very much at- 
tached to France. The country was the most populous 
of all the Balkan states. The chief cause for her entering 
the war, however, was to regain possession of Transyl- 
vania on the other side of the Transylvanian Alps, which 
were inhabited by a large number of Roumanians under 
the rule of the Austro- Hungarian empire. Like so many 
of the smaller nations in the war, her aims were to realize 
the national unity of all her people. The Russian province 
of Bessarabia, which at one time belonged to Roumania, 
was also promised her for her help in the war. Of course, 
every one thought that the purpose of the Allies in having 
Roumania in the war was to give Russia an opportunity 
to cross Roumania's territory, attack Bulgaria, and open 

81 



82 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

a pathway to Greece and Salonica, where a large Alhed 
army was gathered to advance upon Bulgaria and Tur- 
key; but this purpose, if it ever existed, was never put 
into action. The Russians made no move to help the 
Roumanians as was promised when they started the in- 
vasion of Transylvania. 

The story of Roumania's share in the war is a short 
one. Its importance is due to the great possibilities which 
Roumania offered to the Allied cause if Russia had kept 
her agreement, and it had been possible for France and 
England to send their troops into the country. It is im- 
portant also for revealing successful working of the Ger- 
man secret agents ; for there is no doubt that it was through 
the command of Germany that Russia lured the Rou- 
manians into the war and then deserted them. The course 
of events, if they do not absolutely prove, certainly point 
in this direction. 

One hundred days after Roumania declared war 
against Austria, the Germans were in Bucharest, the capi- 
tal of Roumania. Roumania started the war bravely by 
invading Transylvania through three or four passes of the 
Transylvanian Alps, capturing two or three important 
cities. They were allowed to advance without much op- 
position, and then suddenly the German general, von 
Falkenhayn, attacked in the north and von Mackensen, 
with Bulgarians and Germans under his command, ad- 
vanced in the south across the Danube and through the 
Dobrudja, capturing the city of Constantia on the Black 



THE STORY OF ROUMANIA 83 

Sea. The Allies had to stand by helpless and see little 
Roumania crushed. 

It was the story over again of Belgium and Serbia, 
but the Roumanians never ceased, as long as Russia was 
in the war, to be hopeful. They had removed their capital 
to Jassy, near the Russian border, and there reorganized 
their army in preparation for any event that might turn 
in their favor. When Russia made her disgraceful treaty 
with Germany at Brest-Litovsk, the German general, von 
Mackensen, presented the Roumanians with peace terms 
and demanded their acceptance. Even then the brave 
Roumanians refused to submit. They held out for a long 
time, in face of the most hopeless circumstances, and 
made peace with the enemy only when the complete de- 
struction of their country was threatened. 

One of the most heroic figures of the entire war was 
Queen Marie of Roumania. To the outside world she has 
been the pitiful and appealing spokesman of the people's 
suffering, all the more so by her own bereavement and loss 
of her youngest child, whose little body she left in its 
native earth to be defiled by the conqueror's feet, when 
the Court was compelled to flee from Bucharest. She 
went among her people as a common woman, dropping 
her queenly state as she dropped her royal garments, 
working in the hospitals, nursing the wounded, and going 
in and out among the stricken homes of the peasants, com- 
forting them with her sympathy and sustaining their 
King, she kept the spirit of the Roumanian people firm 
spirits with her hope. Even more than her husband, the 



84 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

and hopeful in the faith that their country would be re- 
deemed from the iron grip of the invader and that once 
again they would live in peace and in the possession of all 
that was dear to their freedom. This brave and beautiful 
woman has set an example for all queens who might be 
temporarily without a country and made to endure the 
sacrifices that are endured by her lowest subject. 

Roumania was the only one of the Allied countries 
except Russia whose government was subjected to the 
red terror of Bolshevism from without, and had to endure 
its attack. After her enforced peace with Germany, the 
Roumanians were obliged to contend with the Russian 
Revolutionists in the Ukraine, who sought to dominate the 
nation and win it over to their rule of anarchy. These 
revolutionists, you must remember, were supposedly once 
the friends of the Roumanians; the Russians, you see, 
served the little nation a bad turn at both ends. First 
the Imperial Government betrayed and deserted them, 
secondly the Revolutionists, who overturned that govern- 
ment, sought to poison them with their madness and 
anarchy. It was extremely hard for this courageous na- 
tion to have suffered these experiences. Surrounded by 
her enemies on all sides, the Roumanians showed the un- 
daunted spirit of the Latin in their fortitude. They ac- 
cepted the terms of the German conquest because it was a 
physical thing that could not be escaped for the time being, 
although they were confident of their future release from 
the bondage ; but they would not submit to the poison that 
came trickling out of Russia, because that meant death 



THE STORY OF ROUMANIA 85 

to the soul of the nation, and could be escaped, since their 
spirits were neither weak nor shameless enough to tolerate 
the ideas of the Russian Revolution. So Roumania, 
broken in body, but erect in soul, stood within her iron 
gate of Defeat until the AlHes came with their key of 
Victory to release her. 



CHAPTER VIII 

THE STORY OF THE UNITED STATES 

THE circumstances which led to the entry of the 
United States into the war need not be dis- 
cussed in any detail. It is only necessary to bear 
in mind two facts. The first is, that Germany made war 
upon us and so provoked us to defend ourselves ; the sec- 
ond is, that we made war for an ideal and not for national 
or material profit of any kind. I ought, perhaps, to make 
it clear that we did fight for national profit, which meant 
that we fought to keep and exercise our country's liberty 
of life and action. It was more a privilege than a profit, 
however, because it was something we already had and did 
not want to lose. There was no material ambition in 
having this purpose because it was an ideal one, and we 
were willing to share the fruits of it with all the world. 
Germany had nothing that we wanted to take away from 
her which was once ours, or that we wished to weaken 
because it threatened our supremacy in certain directions, 
like a colony or a navy. She was possessed of an immoral 
and unciviHzed idea, and that we wished to destroy; the 
idea of militarism which was a poison to other nations and 
their freedom. As long as this poison was in her posses- 
sion civilization would remain unhealthy with fear and 



STORY OF THE UNITED STATES 87 

worry and nervous watchfulness lest she should suddenly, 
and in the dark, force it to the lips of mankind. We 
wished to get rid of this poison not merely for ourselves 
alone but for all the other nations who were nearer to her 
hand than we. As far away as we were from her brutal 
fingers, we felt them, through her submarines, creeping, 
creeping slowly through the dark up to our throats, and 
at a time too when we acted with all fairness and im- 
partiality towards her ; we simply were compelled in self- 
defense to push those fingers away before they throttled 
us. So we went to war to save our national life, and the 
lives of other nations. And we asked for no reward except 
this salvation. 

Much of what happened before April 6, 1917, will be 
forgotten, or recalled from the dusty records of the gov- 
ernment to guide historians in their arguments. The 
notes that passed between Washington and Berlin in con- 
troversy over the illegal attacks of the German U-boats 
will be forgotten. What will never be forgotten is the 
sinking of the Lusitania, and the Sussex and the Arabic, 
on which American citizens lost their lives. These acts 
were war pure and simple against an unoffending nation, 
and by a nation that took the pains after each of these 
deeds to express friendship for us. Never was the gov- 
ernment of a great nation so patient and forgiving in the 
face of such crimes, as our government during the two 
long enduring years between the sinking of the Lusitania 
and the declaration of war by the Congress of the United 
States. 



88 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

What followed this declaration will always be a vivid 
page in the history of the American people. The Amer- 
ican people went on a crusade to liberate the world. The 
men from every State in the Union who served under 
General Pershing in the American Expeditionary Force 
in France, you have heard called crusaders; because they 
went as the men of the Middle Ages went to the Holy 
Land to do battle with the Unbelievers for the sacred 
tomb of Christ at Jerusalem. It was a voluntary and self- 
sacrificing pilgrimage. Not only the men of the A. E. F., 
but the entire American people were crusaders. Theirs 
was a voluntary and self-sacrificing pilgrimage of the 
spirit. This spirit leapt in the shining armor of do- 
mestic denials and renunciations to do battle for the great 
cause of liberty. On the battlefields of Europe Freedom 
was stricken and the monster of Tyranny stood ready with 
drawn sword to pierce her through. America heard her 
piteous call for help and sent her sons whose blood averted 
the sword's point and enabled her to rise triumphant. The 
monster Tyranny in chasing Freedom across the fair lands 
of the world to destroy her, had devastated city and coun- 
tryside, and heaped in ruins the harvest-fields and the 
factories, and America was asked to give of her treasure 
to feed and clothe, to provide for comfort and industry, 
and to heal both body and mind. And these things Amer- 
ica labored to do, at the same time she carried on her own 
gigantic task of preparation and fighting. 

What quantity of their treasure did the people sacri- 



STORY OF THE UNITED STATES 89 

fice for the cause that America served? The treasure was 
threefold, of time, labor and money. Let us see. 

The three most necessary things for the winning 
of the war were ships, munitions and food, and, like 
St. Paul, we might name the last as the greatest of 
these. As soon as the country was committed to war 
the government appointed a Council of National Defense, 
an organization which controlled all the domestic activities 
in connection with the war. The men who formed this 
council were men of very large private and professional 
interests, who patriotically gave them up to work for the 
govermnent for "a dollar a year." Men like Mr. Schwab 
and Mr. Hurley took charge of the shipbuilding so that 
America might have sufficient ships to take troops, food 
and munitions overseas. Other equally patriotic Ameri- 
cans served on various boards under the Council of Na- 
tional Defense. The most important of these boards be- 
sides the Shipping Board, were the War Trade, Food and 
Fuel boards. The War Trade Board settled all problems 
that might arise concerninglabor, maintaining production 
and settling disputes between workmen and owners. Mr. 
Hoover took care of the food situation, increasing pro- 
duction and conservation so that the nation might have 
enough for its needs and yet sufficient left over to help 
the needs of England, France and our other Allies. Dr. 
Garfield did the same for the production and conservation 
of fuel, such as coal and gasoline. 

When we recall the meatless, wheatless, coalless days, 
and the gasolineless Sundays, we can now realize two 



90 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

quite important facts about wartime America: the diffi- 
cult tasks these administrators had to perform and the 
sacrifices made on the part of the people to win the war. 
Those days when we had to give up eating a certain kind 
of food or using a particular fuel were something of a 
joke to the people. But there w'as a serious intention 
behind the joke, which only showed how cheerfully the 
nation made its sacrifices. 

In other ways, too, the people w^ere made to feel the 
war at home. Luxuries were frowned upon, and, indeed, 
it was considered unpatriotic to grumble at the discom- 
forts which had necessarily to be endured. The Ameri- 
cans, a travel-loving people, and with a vast and diverse 
country in which to journey, had to put up with a very 
much reduced system of transportation on steam and elec- 
tric railways. 

All these things had to do with what we call the eco- 
nomic side of fighting the war, that is as near as I can 
make you understand the physical battles at home. With- 
out these battles being carried on victoriously, the soldiers 
in the trenches would have been quite helpless to carry 
out America's purpose to defeat the Kaiser and his nation 
of war worshipers. 

These battles at home to build the treasures we so 
gladly accumulated for spending in a righteous though 
fearful cause would have only a part of its soldiers named 
and honored if I forgot to mention the women like your 
mothers and sisters, and also the children of America. 
Your mothers went to help at the Red Cross rooms, mak- 



STORY OF THE UNITED STATES 91 

ing bandages for the wounded and knitting socks and 
sweaters for the men in the trenches ; and your sisters who 
worked in the shops or on the farms ; both, no doubt, gave 
time to the War Community Service, and at the Hostess 
House, where they made the young soldiers training to go 
overseas forget their loneliness and homesickness, with 
comforts and entertaimnents. 

And you. Young America, what services were you ever 
willing to do, those of you who belonged to the Boy or 
Girl Scouts! If you did not belong to either of these 
noble organizations, you did your bit in the war-gardens ; 
you were mindful not to waste food, and to be satisfied 
with ever so much less of the many things that you had 
been accustomed to in plenty. In school you learned to 
perform many tasks that were outside your regular studies, 
to raise money for the school to buy Liberty Bonds. In 
many ways you earned and saved pennies to buy War 
Saving Stamps. In every way, you, too, loyally aided your 
government to win the war. Young America, and it is 
proud of you! 

And you were proud of your country, as you heard 
and saw day after day throughout eighteen months of 
war, what it was accomplishing in the building of ships, 
in the raising of food and money, and in the calling and 
sending of troops across the seas to fight for freedom. 
And how the pride in your hearts must have swelled as 
you thought that all this was done for an unselfish purpose. 

Sometimes you were amazed at what the agents of 
your country's enemy were doing upon your own soil, 



92 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

even before we were at war with him. For the newspapers 
told you of men trying to destroy bridges with dynamite, 
and blowing up munitions factories, causing tremendous 
loss in property and innocent lives. Then you were glad 
with a kind of holy thrill that your flag was leading a 
host of stalwart American youths of all creeds and races 
across the sea and floating in the smoke-filled and thun- 
derous battle air beside the flags of England and France, 
to crush an enemy who would do such things. And can 
you realize what a host that was which your country sent 
to France? And how it kept gathering in the great camps 
from all the States of the Union, from INIaine to Florida, 
from Massachusetts to California, to be drilled and sent, 
division after division, across the broad and rough At- 
lantic ? 

These men who went to fight in France against the 
Hun were the measure of the blood we willingly and un- 
stintedly gave to the great cause. Congress passed a 
Selective Draft Bill shortly after war was declared which 
put nearly ten million young men at the call of the Presi- 
dent, who is the Commander-in-Chief of the Army and 
Navy. The following year a second Draft Bill was 
passed, which extended the military age to forty-five years. 
This made the total number of men registered for mili- 
tary service 23,456,021. Of these 4,000,000 men were 
under arms when the war ended; 2,000,000 of these were 
in France, and hundreds of thousands went under fire. 

What a splendid record for a peace-loving nation to 
make in so short a while! There had been a few far- 



STORY OF THE UNITED STATES 93 

seeing prophets like General Leonard Wood and ex-Pres- 
ident Roosevelt who warned us to prepare for the war 
that was coming nearer with every passing month of the 
years 1914, 1915 and 1916, but we failed to heed their 
voices as we should have done. Our neglect might have 
been very costly. But America knows how when the oc- 
casion calls to rise and meet it. She works like a giant 
to make good the opportunities that have passed. Her 
energy surprises the world. She is quick to learn what 
is needed to be done. She neither stops to fret nor regret, 
but throws her supple body and eager spirit into the doing 
of the task with a confidence that is half the achievement. 

With a valor that surprised the veteran troops of 
England and France, our men did their duty. In many 
instances they did more than was expected of them. The 
Germans did not believe that men who were taken from 
the shop and office and peaceful professions, and given but 
a few months' training, would stand up against their own 
well-seasoned and disciplined troops. They learned from 
sorry experience that the Americans could not only stand 
but fight man to man. They saw their best troops badly 
defeated by the doughboys, who were tilling the farms, 
selling merchandise, or at a factory bench, and led by 
officers who had been poring over text-books in quiet col- 
lege dormitories, or who had just hopefully begun their 
careers in business or the professions, when the German 
Crown Prince was vainly battering at the gates of Verdun. 

At Seicheprey and Bouresches Wood our men were 
given that baptism of blood which at Belleau Wood and 



94 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

Chateau-Thierry gave them the strength to stand like a 
wall and check the flood of gray Huns. At St. Mihiel 
they broke through the fiery barrier and they pierced the 
death-infested Forest of the Argonne, going through to 
stand before the iron city of Metz many hundred thousand 
strong, for the final blow against the military power of 
Germany. 

These men paid in blood to vanquish an evil idea. 
Where they fell and stained the soil of a foreign land is 
sacred ground. Their memories will long be cherished 
not only by Americans, but by Frenchmen, Englishmen, 
Italians, and all the Allies with whom they stood. Their 
memories will be cherished because they fought for one 
thing, and one thing only — Freedom I The Freedom that 
would bring Peace and Security to the whole world! 



CHAPTER IX 

THE STORY OF GREECE 

NO country gave the Allies more difficulties to solve 
than Greece. The people of Greece, under the 
leadership of Premier Venizelos, were on the 
side of the Allied cause, and justly too, not only be- 
cause it was for their best interests, but because they 
owed it out of gratitude. England, France and Russia 
had helped Greece to secure her independence, which they 
agreed to protect. These countries also contributed sums 
of money for the personal use of the Greek sovereigns to 
help relieve the people of the expense of supporting the 
royal family. 

King Constantine and his queen Louise, who was the 
sister of the German emperor, favored the cause of Ger- 
many very strongly. They influenced the court to sup- 
port them and take their side against the people. The 
king worked very hard to maintain what is called a "benefi- 
cent neutrality" towards the Allies. Now a beneficent 
neutrality means that a government should show a little 
more favor in the way of doing little helpful things for a 
belligerent without actually fighting. In doing this King 
Constantine was really doing nothing more than express- 
ing a sentiment that he did not practice, and merely as a 

95 



96 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

concession to the Greek people who desired to fight at the 
side of Serbia against Bulgaria. They were powerless 
to do more than express their condemnation at the action 
of the king, who was kept to his unpatriotic purpose by 
his bad-tempered German queen and the Kaiser's agents 
at his court. 

After the second Balkan war when Serbia and Greece 
defeated Bulgaria, an agreement was made between the 
first two countries that they should aid each other in case 
of attack by another country. The king said that this 
agreement only applied to Bulgaria. It was his excuse to 
keep the country from going to war against Germany on 
the side of the Allies. But when Bulgaria entered the 
war, and attacked Serbia, and the people demanded that 
their word to Serbia be kept, the king still held out. He 
no longer sought to justify his action in dishonoring the 
promise to Serbia. With simple and dogged persistence 
he said that Germany was going to win the war, and 
pointing to the example of Belgium and Serbia, declared 
it was national suicide for Greece to fight against such a 
powerful enemy. It was for the best interest of Greece, 
he said, that he keep her out of the war. 

No one believed this because all the time the king's 
actions showed what his intentions were. The Bulgars 
were allowed to occupy the fort at Kavala on Greek terri- 
tory from which the Greek troops, adherents of Con- 
stantine's policy, were taken and sent into Germany. Be- 
fore this event Great Britain had offered Greece the island 
of Cyprus to join in the war on the side of the Allies, 



THE STORY OF GREECE 97 

which she refused. It was humiliating to Great Britain 
to have her offer spurned by little Greece, whose pro- 
tector she had been. 

Constantine even went beyond his rights under the 
constitution to keep Greece neutral, or at least so long 
as was necessary until the time came, as he believed it 
would, when he could safely strike at the Allies. He sus- 
pended the sittings of the Greek Parliament and carried 
on the government through ministers who did his bidding. 
M. Venizelos, the great man of Greece, after a hopeless 
fight against the king and his party, fell from power. An 
election took place, and the people unmistakably expressed 
their wish to join in the war on the side of the Allies. 
So Venizelos was heartily supported by the country, and 
the king had no other right under the constitution but to 
reappoint him Premier, that he might enact the people's 
will. Instead the king in direct violation of his position, 
appointed another statesman, M. Skouloudis, to carry out 
the royal will. M. Venizelos went to Salonica, where a 
large Allied army was encamped, and set up a Provisional 
Government. All Greece was disrupted by the dispute 
between the king and his former minister. 

I have mentioned the AlHed army at Salonica, a sea- 
port in Greek Macedonia on the Gulf of Salonica. This 
army was composed of British, French, Italian, and Ser- 
bian troops, and had gathered there to go to the aid of 
Serbia. But when this was out of the question it re- 
mained, because the Allies were afraid to withdraw it 
owing to the treacherous attitude of King Constantine. 



98 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

This vast army might have been used to advance upon 
Bulgaria, but it became known that should it move north 
over the perilous mountainous country to the Bulgarian 
border, the communications with its base at Salonica could 
not be securely maintained, and Constantine, at the com- 
mand of Germany, would attack it. in the rear. So the 
Salonica army remained idle during the greater part of 
the war. 

When the attitude of King Constantine became in- 
tolerable the Allies decided to act. The Allies did not 
wish to make the people suffer for the behavior of their 
king, even though he had taken over their rights in his 
own person and stood between them and their real friends, 
the French and British. They did for a while blockade 
the Greek coast and thus cut off many supplies the coun- 
try needed. But it was soon realized that this was not 
the way to keep the Greeks as their friends, and so the 
blockade was lifted. A more effective way was to get 
rid of King Constantine and his German queen for the 
people's sake and the Allies' interests. So France, in be- 
half of the Allies, sent an Admiral from one of her war- 
ships to Athens to demand the abdication of the king. 
He submitted, and with his queen retired to Switzerland, 
where he lived in disgraced and defeated exile. 

Under the new king, Alexander, Venizelos came into 
power, reorganized the government and the army and 
threw the country into the war on the side of the Allies. 
And so Greece at last shared in the defeat of Bulgaria 
and the Allied victory. 



CHAPTER X 

THE STORY OF THE OTHER BELLIGERENTS 

I HAVE tried to give you some idea of the nations 
at war whose troops fought in Europe. Some of 
these nations, like England, France, Russia, and 
Italy, sent troops to fight in Asia and Africa. The main 
theater of conflict, however, was in Europe. The fiercest 
and most important battles were fought on the western 
front, but there were other nations who were belligerents 
as well, in the sense that they were on the side of the Allies 
against Germany, who did not send any troops to Europe, 
and indeed, in many instances, never engaged in battle 
at all. It may be a little hard to make you understand 
just what their position in the Great War was from a mili- 
tary point of view. Yet they all had a more or less potent 
influence upon the outcome of the war. They contrib- 
uted in one way or another to final victory. What they 
did not do by actually sending troops to fight in the 
trenches, they made up in other ways. At home, the 
smaller of these nations did their share in supplying what 
they could of the many necessities that were needed. 
Others, the larger and more populous nations, sent large 
numbers of laborers to work behind the lines in France 
and in the Balkans. This was true of China, which sent 

99 



100 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

many thousands of her citizens to perform the laborious 
tasks that the armies needed done. Many of the natives 
of South Africa, as well as the coolies of India, rendered 
this same service to the Allied cause. Without them many 
of the soldiers of England and France would not have 
been free to fight in the trenches. While there is no 
romance or glamor attached to what they did, we all owe 
them a debt of gratitude, for they helped in this way to 
make victory possible. 

One of these belligerents, whose story I have not told 
as a separate nation because it doesn't differ very mate- 
rially from that of Serbia, is Montenegro. Indeed her 
position was identical with that of Serbia, and she suf- 
fered the same kind of invasion and defeat. This tiny 
kingdom in the Balkans is one of the most intrepid na- 
tions in Europe, who long ago won its independence, and 
behind the impenetrable wall of its mountainous country 
was able to keep it for centuries against the attacks of 
the Turks. The invasion and defeat inflicted by the Aus- 
trians was due in a large measure to the destructive power 
of modern artillery, which was able to reach into the very 
heart of the mountains and overcome the heroic resistance 
of the defenders. 

The other small countries, however, who had either de- 
clared war against Germany or severed relations, were 
too weak from a military point of view or too far away 
to make, it worth while to send such small numbers of 
troops as they had to the European battlefields. One ex- 
ception, of course, must be made of Portugal. Separated 



THE OTHER BELLIGERENTS 101 

as she was from France by Spain, a neutral country, and 
compelled to transport troops by sea to the battlefields, 
Portugal sent her soldiers and took an honorable part in 
the fighting. The countries like Siam, Liberia, Cuba, 
and Nicaragua merely kept their troops, such as they had, 
on a war footing at home. JMost of these countries, and 
especially the Latin republics of the western hemisphere, 
took the stand against Germany as a sympathetic approval 
of the attitude of the United States in declaring war 
against Germany. It was a method of showing their ap- 
proval that America was fighting for the highest ideal, 
and under that ideal they sought protection. Thus it was 
that such countries as Bolivia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, 
Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Peru, and San Domingo 
severed relations with the Imperial German Government. 
Even Brazil, a country with territory larger than the 
United States, and with a population of nearly 25,000,000 
people, did not, although she was provoked by the attacks 
and sinking of her merchant ships by the German U-boats, 
declare war against Germany until some months after the 
United States. Her part in the war was largely the sup- 
pression of the German colonists in South America, who 
did everything they could to direct public opinion in favor 
of the German cause, and to interfere with the contribu- 
tions of food and material which the South American 
Republics were sending to the Allies. Only one, however, 
of the other nations was a first-class power, and that was 
Japan. The situation in regard to Japan was very pe- 
culiar. She had long been an ally of Great Britain ; and 



102 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

it was chiefly on account of this that she entered the war. 
Her duty was to look out after British interests in the 
far east and to keep the waters of the eastern hemisphere 
free from German warships in the early part of the 
struggle. 

Her first move, however, after Japan declared war 
against Germany was to land at Chiou-chau and advance 
upon Tsing-tau, a German colony in China, which was 
captured within two months. This was practically the 
extent of the Japanese fighting on land during nearly the 
entire course of the war. Towards the end they landed 
troops in Siberia for the protection of the Allied stores 
against the Bolsheviki. 

Japan manufactured large quantities of munitions 
most of which were sent to Russia. The war made the 
Japanese very rich. It is true that she did help her Allies 
very greatly by her command of the waters of the Pacific 
and Indian Ocean and the China Sea. She also drove 
Germany out of the smaller islands of the South Pacific; 
but beyond this, her active participation in the war was 
very slight. 

You may wonder, perhaps, why it was that Japan did 
not send troops to fight in Europe. She had a very large 
army, well trained and equipped, which might have been 
very useful to France and England in the early days of 
the war. The reason is easily explained. In the first 
place, despite the very real assistance her soldiers in Eu- 
rope might have given, it was very much against the wish 
of the English govermnent, in particular, that Japan 



THE OTHER BELLIGERENTS 103 

should be more closely concerned with European affairs. 
Since she had grown to be a first-class power, Japan had 
refrained from interfering with purely European affairs; 
and in return, wished to be recognized as supreme in the 
east ; that is to say, since the war with Russia in which she 
had been victorious, Japan began to extend her influence 
over China and Korea and did not wish the European na- 
tions in any way to weaken this influence. The war gave 
her an opportunity to get rid of the German power in the 
east ; and when she had driven them out of Chiou-chau, she 
was satisfied to keep her soldiers at home and have her 
people work, rather than fight, for the Allies. Her Allies 
were equally satisfied with this arrangement. There have 
been some people who said that the war might have been 
won sooner had Japanese troops been sent to fight in 
Europe. Indeed, there were certain public men in Eng- 
land who proposed to their government the advisability of 
inviting the Japanese to send an army to fight beside the 
French and British. 

To be perfectly honest, the English government was 
a little afraid to put itself under such an obligation to the 
Japanese. Friends as they were and closely bound to- 
gether as they were in preserving peace in the east, the 
English did not care to give the Japanese a voice in the 
settlement of purely European affairs, because they were 
an eastern people, and vastly different in race and tradi- 
tion. The Japanese in consequence gained more in a mate- 
rial way and sacrificed less, than any of the Great Powers 
engaged in the war. The position they meant to hold in 



104 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

the east was plainly shown hy the demands they made 
upon China in 1915 when all the Allies were too busy 
fighting Germany to interfere. These demands, to which 
helpless China was obliged to submit, made Japan her 
master. With the kingdom of Korea also under her 
dominion, and with the German colonies which- came into 
her hands, Japan became lord of the mighty east. No one 
can say that Japan failed to do her duty towards her 
Allies, but those duties were simple and small, and com- 
pared to the benefits which she received from the war, — 
the immensely increased prosperity to her people, her un- 
disputed leadership of all the people in the far east, — her 
reward was immense. 



CHAPTER XI 

THE STORY OF THE NEUTRALS 

WHEN the war ended there were few important 
nations and no really first-class power that had 
remained neutral throughout the conflict. 
From 1914 to 1917, America was the only great nation 
who did so. The course of events which finally drew 
America into the war had long before robbed Germany of 
any sympathy which the people of the world might have 
had for her. It is perfectly true to say that there were no 
peoples among the nations that were not actually fighting 
with Germany, who had sympathy for her. Her acts had 
killed any such feeling among the people all over the world. 
But while the peoples of the world were not neutral in feel- 
ing, their governments had to maintain a strict neutrality. 
This was the only lawful attitude they could take and 
keep out of war; yet this lawful attitude was sometimes 
but a very thin disguise for certain governments. It was 
notable that the courts of Sweden and Spain were pro- 
German. Many reasons have been given to explain this 
attitude on their part. It was very hard for the people 
of these two countries to endure the attitude of their gov- 
ernments, because Germany did not hesitate to violate 
their rights on sea when it suited her purpose. After the 

105 



106 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

United States entered the war Spain was the strongest of 
all the neutral nations. It was all that the Spanish gov- 
ernment could do from time to time to keep the people 
of Spain from forcing it into war on the side of the Allies. 
One fact, however, strengthened the hand of the govern- 
ment in its pro-German feeling, and that was the question 
of Gibraltar. The Spanish people hesitated to fight on 
the side of a nation, whom they still regarded in wrongful 
possession of Gibraltar; and the Spanish statesmen could 
always hold this as a check against the over-enthusiasm of 
the Spanish people in the Allied cause. On the other hand, 
Spain had little to fear, beyond the occasional sinking of 
her merchant ships, from an attack by the German army, 
because there was redoubtable France to stand as a wall 
between Spain and Germany. The case was quite differ- 
ent from the smaller neutral nations who bordered or were 
not far from the German frontier, such as Switzerland, 
Holland, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway. Of all these 
countries, Switzerland was in the most dangerous position 
between the belligerent countries; and yet she was the 
safest, because of her mountainous territory. The Swiss, 
alone among the small neutrals that lay in the shadow of 
the German sword, stood bravely and defiantly ready to 
defend herself. All during the war as a neutral, she was 
the asylum of almost every kind of refugee from the em- 
battled nations. She was a place of exile and hospitality, 
and a channel of communication. Through it, important 
enemy news not connected with the battlefield was ex- 
changed. Switzerland, as you know, borders France, Ger- 



THE STORY OF THE NEUTRALS 107 

many and Italy, and where her frontiers touch these coun- 
tries, the inhabitants are largely French, Italian, and Ger- 
man. Naturally these inliabitants sympathized with their 
country in the conflict, and it was all that the Swiss gov- 
ernment could do to prevent them, by act or word, from 
compromising her neutrality. It was through Switzerland 
that streamed from time to time prisoners of war ex- 
changed by the combatants. Nothing was more pathetic 
than this picture of the prisoners being returned from 
Germany, broken in health after their sad experiences in 
German prisons, and greeted with deep emotion by their 
countrymen at the Swiss frontier. The neutrality of no 
other country was made to serve the humane needs of all 
the belligerents as that of Switzerland. Monarchs, states- 
men, philosophers, artists, and socialists who could not ap- 
prove of war, retired into Switzerland, from all countries, 
where they found security and peace. 

Of all the small neutrals, Holland lived constantly 
under the fear of Germany all through the war. She had 
to depend upon Germany for coal, and Germany took ad- 
vantage and forced Holland to import for her needs great 
quantities of food and material. The same was quite true 
of Denmark and Sweden, but not to the same extent as 
in the case of Holland. There are facts to prove that the 
importation of foodstuffs into Holland was far in excess 
of what was needed by the small population of the coun- 
try. As nothing could get into Germany direct, owing to 
the British blockade, Holland, as well as Denmark, was 
reshipping food into Germany in spite of her promises. 



108 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

Germany also demanded of Holland great quantities of 
sand and gravel which were necessary for her war needs. 
It was for these materials that Germany was supposed to 
exchange coal, her supply of which, before the war, Hol- 
land had obtained from England. The coal was in reahty 
exchanged for food which Holland obtained from the 
United States. 

When the United States realized this fact, the traffic 
had been going on for some time. Measures were adopted 
to stop it. The ships of Holland were seized and kept in 
American ports. This angered the Germans quite as 
much as it did the Dutch, but they were helpless. Little 
Holland was in a very difficult position. Too weak to do 
anything in her self-defense, she stoutly declared on more 
than one occasion that she stood ready to defend her 
neutrality against either the Germans or the Allies, if 
attacked. 

Denmark, too, helped to furnish the Germans with 
foodstuffs, though she did not make as profitable a busi- 
ness of it as the Dutch. Sweden was another of these small 
neutrals who carried on a prosperous trade with Germany, 
but came nearer than any other to being forced into the 
war against her will. Sweden had a bitter controversy 
with England owing to the interference of the British 
navy with Swedish ships, which were searched for contra- 
band. Public opinion in Sweden on account of this was 
much aroused and sympathy towards the German cause 
was openly expressed. This in spite of the fact that the 
German submarines did not spare any Swedish ship which 



THE STORY OF THE NEUTRALS 109 

it thought was carrying food to England; nor, indeed, did 
the German submarines hesitate to sink Norwegian, Dan- 
ish or Dutch ships when they saw fit to do so. 

The five European countries, Denmark, Holland, Nor- 
way, Spain, and Switzerland were the only neutrals after 
1917 who could possibly have changed the course of the 
war by joining one side or the other of the belligerents. 
The other neutrals, far distant from the scene of conflict, 
like Abyssinia in Africa, Afghanistan in Asia, Argentina 
or Chile or Paraguay in South America, could have but 
little effect one way or the other. But the Great War was 
such an enormous thing, reaching out everywhere in un- 
expected places that even these far distant neutrals were 
themselves affected as the conflict waged, swaying in 
favor of first one side and then the other. The neutral 
nations were eight less in number than the belligerents; 
but, as I have said, there was not among them a real first- 
class power. It is the little group of four, Holland, Den- 
mark, Norway, and Sweden, whose population together 
does not exceed twelve million, that is, one-fifth less than 
the population of Mexico, that remained, in defiance of 
fate, neutral throughout the war. It is certain that had 
any of these countries entered the war against Germany, 
she would have crushed it as she crushed Belgium and 
Serbia. It would simply be a case of another small nation 
satisfying the German hunger for conquest, which could 
not be satisfied by enemies who were her equal. Except 
for the fact of having saved their country from ruin and 



110 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

desolation, the people of these neutral countries suffered 
almost as badly as many of the countries who were at war. 
To have survived fear of the Hunnish terror was in itself 
a heroic endurance and that was what they did. 



PART III 
HOW THE WAR WAS FOUGHT 



CHAPTER I 

the campaigns of 1914 

On the Western Front 

The Drive for Paris 

I AM going to try and tell you as simply as possible 
how the war was fought. It is not a very easy task 
to do this for reasons which, should I attempt to 
explain, would confuse for you the main outhnes of ac- 
tion. There are a few things that you ought to under- 
stand at the beginning, for they will make clear to you, 
as this narrative of the battles unfolds, what was the object 
of the armies on both sides. As a step to this understand- 
ing you must realize that unlike the battles in the wars of 
the past, the terrific battles of the Great War were not 
measured by hours but by weeks and months. A cam- 
paign in the old wars was a series of skirmishes with long 
periods of absolute inactivity, and was finally decided in a 
great battle lasting a few hours or a day at most. The 
campaigns of the Great War consisted of one or two im- 
mense battles lasting for weeks and months, which were 
called "offensives," and between these offensives were 
furious local attacks that lasted for days at a time. In- 
activity was only applied to the troops when they re- 

113 



114 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

mained on guard in the trenches. But the armies cannot 
be said as a whole to be inactive, because the artillery on 
both sides was forever bombarding each other's lines, which 
made it necessary to keep on the lookout day and night for 
attack. You must realize that the battlefield was one 
long irregular line which was called No Man's Land, on 
each side of which was a system of trenches running back 
for many miles. This line on the western front ran from 
the Belgium coast on the North Sea to the borders of 
Switzerland, a distance of nearly five hundred miles. On 
the eastern front it ran from the Baltic Sea in northern 
Russia to the borders of Roumania in the south, a distance 
of over a thousand miles. And on the other fronts in 
Europe and Asia where the armies were entrenched, this 
line ran in varying lengths as the battles swayed in favor 
of one side or the other. 

It is important as we follow the fighting to keep this 
line well in mind. It was the purpose of each army to 
break through the side of this line which was held by the 
enemy. The entrenched system of warfare, which was 
perfected with such skill by every constructive and pro- 
tective means known, made this very difficult to do. To 
attack the line in front was very costly in human life, and 
even with the heaviest artillery preparation, was only 
partially successful. Yet it was the purpose of both sides 
for over three years after the Battle of the Aisne when 
trench warfare began, to break through with the intention 
of flanking the enemy. To flank the enemy was, after 
breaking through, to attack him on the side, cut off his 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1914 115 

communications of supplies and reenforcements, have him 
in a trap and thus kill and capture his troops. 

This line, as I have said, ran very irregularly, and 
there existed deep pockets, or what were called "salients" 
in the enemy's positions. The dangerous salients were 
those that had a much greater depth than breadth ; that is, 
the base from side to side was much shorter than the dis- 
tance from the base to the top. This exposed an army to 
an attack on both flanks which, if successful, crushed the 
salient in. A general had to get his troops, supplies and 
artillery out before this happened, or his loss would be 
very great. The Germans operated this flanking strategy 
on an immense scale, which was popularly known as the 
"pincer movement"; the jaws of the pincers would in some 
cases be two or three hundred miles apart. They were 
very much more successful in operating this pincer move- 
ment on the eastern and Balkan fronts than on the west- 
ern front which did not allow the room for action on such 
a large scale. The British and French, too, were always 
making small attacks for the purpose of rectifying, that 
is, in straightening out, their lines to prevent the Germans, 
from making successful flank attacks. The Germans, 
however, held a number of deep salients in the Allied lines, 
notably the one at Ypres and St. Mihiel. The Ypres 
salient was the scene of much bloody fighting before it was 
flattened. 

It took the belligerents on both sides over three years 
to realize that this line which was one continuous battle- 
front, could not be permanently broken. A gap would 



116 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

be made in the line, but before the enemy could widen it 
to any extent to get through large enough bodies of troops 
to make flanking attacks to the right and left, a second 
system of trenches would hold him up until reenf orcements 
arrived to counter-attack and drive him back. Thus the 
line would be mended again and made as strong as ever, 
and the effort had to be repeated all over. 

A determined offensive with thousands of guns of all 
calibers firing thousands and thousands of tons of high ex- 
plosives would prepare the way for infantry advances day 
after day for weeks and months. The gi'ound gained 
would be very small for the terrible sacrifice of life and 
the costly expenditure of shells. At the end of four 
months as at the Battle of the Somme, or of six months 
as at the Battle of Verdun, there would be a number of 
villages and towns taken within a few miles of territory 
to show what the victor had won or lost. The claim of 
the victor was not in the miles he had advanced or the 
places taken; it was the loss he inflicted upon the enemy 
in casualties and prisoners that counted. And oh, how 
hard it is for us to grasp the extent of the losses! The 
hundreds and hundreds of thousands of men who were 
killed, wounded and taken prisoner, that this long, waver- 
ing line might not be permanently broken! 

Perhaps you think I have said too much about this hne 
which, on the western front, where the fiercest battles 
were fought and the largest number of men were engaged, 
swayed back and forth from the North Sea to Switzer- 
land, for over four long, weary years. But I have not, 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1914 117 

indeed, because that line was the symbol of hope to all the 
world. Millions and millions of men were bound to it like 
prisoners, and like prisoners sought time and again to win 
freedom by breaking through it, only to find that it would 
never break, only bend, bend, eternally bend and hold 
them in its iron grasp. And when as you follow the battles 
I shall describe, think of it as entangling for nearly four 
years the feet of the Allied armies until freeing themselves 
from it, the mighty genius of Marshal Foch swung it 
around the neck of Ludendorf's armies and choked the 
military might of imperial Germany to death. 

When Germany began hostilities she planned to crush 
France by advancing upon Paris from three directions. 
Five armies came rolling down the line of the river Meuse 
and the IMoselle, while a sixth and seventh, starting from 
Metz and Strassburg, were to pass the frontier in front 
of Nancy. It was a great converging movement, in which 
the seven armies were to meet in an encirclement of Paris 
and capture it. The Germans confidently expected that 
this would happen in about six weeks. With France de- 
feated and put out of the war, Germany would then turn 
her attention to Russia, who, it was believed, would not be 
ready to fight, and defeat her in the same sharp and speedy 
fashion. 

The First German army under General von Kluck, 
the Second under General von Biilow, the Third under 
General von Hansen, swept westward into Belgium; the 
Fourth under the Grand Duke of Wiirtemburg marched 
westward across Luxemburg and a corner of Belgium to 



118 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

the French border; the Fifth under the German Crown 
Prince went across the lower end of Luxemburg and came 
out into France ; the Sixth under Crown Prince Ruprecht 
of Bavaria, and the Seventh under General von Heer- 
insren, we will leave for the moment in Lorraine and Al- 
sace to meet the French advance. The general strategy 
of this whole movement was to sweep into France behind 
the great barrier fortresses of Toul, Epinal and Belfort. 
Passing through Belgium and Luxemburg the task was 
comparatively easy. 

The three armies on the extreme right of the German 
line turned southwest from Brussels, Namur and Dinant 
towards the French frontier. The army on the extreme 
right wing under von Kluck met and defeated the gallant 
little Belgian army under King Albert at Vise. The 
Belgians made a stand in the fortress of Liege which the 
Germans captured, the Belgians retiring to Antwerp. 
Then the Germans turned southwest. 

Let us return for a moment to the Sixth and Seventh 
German armies in Alsace and Lorraine. The French 
when hostilities began pushed an army across the border 
into the "Lost Provinces" and captured Altkirch and 
Miililhausen. They lost this place by a surprise night at- 
tack, but regained it once more under the command of 
General Pau. At the same time other French troops 
were pouring over the crests of the Vosges towards the 
Rhine. The French people were much elated over these 
successes. France had expected that the Germans would 
attack her through Alsace-Lorraine, and these early sue- 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1914 119 

cesses gave them, as it was supposed, a great advantage. 
The Germans did not contest this advance very strongly. 
It was not until the French reached Morhange that they 
met any considerable number of the enemy. Here they 
suffered a very heavy defeat, and were driven back across 
the frontier to make a stand at ISTancy. This battle was 
fought on August 20th. 

The French had realized by this time that the Germans 
were coming in force through Belgium and not across 
the Alsace-Lorraine border, which compelled them to 
change altogether their plan of campaign. The French 
armies had been defeated by the German Crown Prince 
near Virton, and the Duke of Wiirtemburg near Neuf- 
chateau, and further north, a French army under Lanzerec 
and the British army under Sir John French had come 
into contact with the Germans at Charleroi and Mons. 
Both were defeated. All along the line the French had 
lost and were thrown back upon their own territory. Gen- 
eral Joffre then ordered his armies north of Verdun to 
retreat. The Crown Prince had been stopped north of 
Verdun but his army had entered France as far south as 
St. Mihiel and north of Toul and Nancy. Here he was 
held. In front of Nancy, along the frontier southward, 
and over the border at Miilhausen, the French held under 
the severe attacks of the Germans in two terrific battles 
along the Grand Couronne. Here General DeCastelnau 
by a most heroic defense stopped the Germans from enter- 
ing France from the east and linking up with the armies 
coming down from Belgium in the north. This fighting 



120 THE STORY OF THE GREAT AVAR 

was, in fact, the first stage of the Battle of the Marne. If 
the French had failed on the eastern frontier, it would have 
been impossible for them to make a stand on the Marne. 

General Joffre now began the wonderful retreat of 
all the armies under his command, through Belgium and 
northern France. What his plans were no one knew, but 
that he had a plan was evident, because he would not, 
under the most favorable circumstances, let any of his 
armies attack. The retreat of the British from Mons was 
the most difficult of all. General von Kluck opposed Gen- 
eral French, the British commander, and tried all the way 
across France to outflank him on his extreme left. For 
this purpose he sent his cavalry sweeping in a wide semi- 
circle around Lille, La Bassee, Amiens and down to Senlis 
just to the northeast of Paris. But this vast effort the 
British withstood, fighting heroically behind shallow 
trenches and falling back in good order until they crossed 
the Marne, where they halted during the first days of Sep- 
tember just below Coulommiers, southeast of Paris. On 
this long retreat many fierce engagements took place, but 
mercilessly the German armies came rolling on towards 
Paris as if nothing would stop them. 

The first days of September found the French armies 
standing on a line just east of Paris to Verdun some forty 
or fifty miles within the French border opposite Metz in 
Lorraine. During the long retreat General Joffre had 
created two new armies, the Sixth and Ninth. One of these 
armies had been sent out of Paris in taxicabs by General 
Gallieni, the military governor of the capital, and put un- 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1914 121 

der the command of General Manoury to attack von Kluck 
on his left flank which he left exposed. The other was 
placed under General Foch who took a position at the 
center of the long battle-line many miles from Paris at La 
Fere-Champenoise. 

General JofFre brought his retreat to a halt and on 
the evening of September 5th, gave his famous order to ad- 
vance. In an address to the commanders of all the armies 
he said, "The hour has come to advance at all costs and 
die where you stand rather than to give way." The Battle 
of the Marne had begun. The most decisive battle in the 
history of the world was fought, the battle that saved 
France and civilization by rolling the German hordes away 
from the gates of Paris. 

The Battle of the Marne has been called a miracle. 
You remember that when the British were attacked by 
such overwhelming odds at Mons, when there seemed no 
hope of being saved from absolute destruction by the 
enemy, the soldiers said thej^ saw a host of angels with 
long bows who attacked the Germans and sent them flying 
in fear and disorder. The angels of Mons may have been 
an apparition of the overwrought nerves and tired bodies 
of the defeated British; but it is a fact, nevertheless, that 
the British did escape destruction by a miracle, and this 
miracle was attributed to a host of angel bowmen. This 
legend cannot be explained. The miracle of the Marne 
can be. Though the Germans greatly outnumbered the 
French and British forces, the superior military genius 
of General Joffre and General Foch, and the heroic fight- 



122 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

ing of their troops, turned what was a certain defeat into 
victory. 

Von Kkick, who had a part of his army across the 
Marne after coming down across the base of Paris on the 
southeast, suddenly withdrew when he found Manoury's 
Sixth French army on his flank. The British ought to 
have attacked von Kluck before he re-crossed the Marne. 
They lost an opportunity for v/hich they have been blamed. 
Had this opportunity been taken, von Kluck's army would 
have been wholly destroyed. 

The battle raged for three days without any change. 
General Foch in the center at La Fere-Champenoise in 
command of the Ninth French army, suffering terribly 
from the attacks of von Hansen's Third German army. 
He was opposed by the famous crack troops of the Prus- 
sian Guard. On the evening of September 9th, the right 
wing of his army was in retreat, the center was beaten 
back, but his left stood firm. On his left he had stationed 
his Forty-second, or Iron Division, supported by Moroc- 
can troops. These he held all the afternoon. The keen 
military genius of General Foch had discovered that the 
Prussian guards were divided in front of him by the 
marshes of St. Gond. 

When von Kluck was attacked by Manoury on his 
flank and had moved up to meet it, he drew von Billow's 
Second German army to the west to keep in touch with 
him. Then, likewise it drew von Hansen's right wing to- 
ward the west, and this left a gap in von Hausen's army 
near the marshes of St. Gond. When General Foch dis- 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1914 123 

covered this gap, he sent the famous dispatch to General 
Joffre in which he said, "My center is beaten, my right 
retreats, but I attack." Around six o'clock in the after- 
noon of September 9th, he gave the command to his Iron 
Division to advance. They went through and routed von 
Hausen's Third German army. It was a glorious attack, 
and turned the tide of battle in favor of the French. The 
Germans began a retreat which continued all through the 
night and the next two days. The four German armies 
ran headlong for the river Aisne. Many prisoners were 
taken ; the Germans left behind great quantities of ammu- 
nition and guns. The German retreat was so rapid that 
the French were unable to bring up their guns and ammu- 
nition to keep in touch with the enemy. They were also 
too exhausted to fight to keep the Germans from en- 
trenching behind the river Aisne. On the next day, Sep- 
tember 10th, the armies of the Crown Prince and the Duke 
of Wiirtemburg, which did not take part in the battle, 
were also compelled to retreat east of Verdun to keep in 
alignment with the German armies further west that had 
been defeated. It was the first victory that turned the 
conquering German armies away from Paris and changed 
for good the course of the war. France was thrilled by 
this great victory. For it, the world owes her a great debt 
of gratitude. 

The Battle of Flanders and the Race for the 
Channel Ports 

The blow at Paris was aimed for a decision — and the 



124 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

Germans missed. At the Battle of the Aisne the French 
and British forces failed to drive the Germans out of their 
entrenchments. The enemy was contented to defend their 
position along this line while the bulk of their armies 
turned elsewhere to obtain a decision. 

Foiled in their effort to take Paris and thrown back 
to the Aisne, it was at this time that the Germans first 
bombarded the cathedral of Rheims. The wantonness of 
this act shocked the world. This beautiful Gothic struc- 
ture, a vision in stone of man's homage and faith in the 
Almighty, was by this barbarous deed of the Germans 
doomed to destruction. At intervals, all during the war, 
the enemy trained their guns upon the cathedral of 
Rheims, battering this precious monument of art and 
poetry into a pile of ruins. 

Russia was causing considerable alarm by the progress 
her armies were making in the invasion of East Prussia. 
Before, however, the Germans turned to the east to dis- 
pose of the Russians, they made another effort to bring 
the campaign on the western front to a successful end be- 
fore the winter set in. The Germans missed a wonderful 
opportunity in the drive through Belgium in not stopping 
long enough to capture the Channel ports of Dunkirk and 
Calais. They could have captured these with very little 
effort because neither the Belgian, British nor French 
armies were strong enough or in a position to defend these 
cities. So the Germans sent an army north to take Ant- 
werp, one of the strongest fortified cities in Europe. What 
was left of the Belgian army was here. But although 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1914 125 

helped by some Naval Reserves which the British sent to 
join the Belgians in defending the city, the forts protect- 
ing it could not withstand the giant howitzers that rained 
tons of explosives upon them. They fell, and the city 
itself was bombarded. The Germans entered Antwerp 
on October 8th, the Belgian army just making good its 
escape, with the help of British warships off shore, along 
a narrow strip of coast to Nieuport and Dixmude. 

The intention of the Germans quickly became plain to 
General JofFre. Both sides began shifting armies from 
the line running east and west between the rivers Oise 
and Meuse, to a line running north from the Oise at 
Noyon through Arras, La Bassee, Lille, Ypres, and Dix- 
mude to Nieuport on the North Sea. 

The Battle of Flanders in which the Germans on one 
side and the Belgians, British and French on the other, 
fought for the possession of the Channel ports opened in 
October and was one of the most bitterly contested en- 
gagements of the whole war. General Foch who had 
achieved such a brilliant success at the Battle of the Marne 
was in supreme command of the Allied armies. 

Calais had now become to the Germans what Paris 
had been, up to their defeat at the Marne. It was de- 
sired even more than Paris, for with Calais in their hands 
the Germans had a base for striking at England whom 
they hated more than any of their enemies. Gathering all 
the troops that she could muster, Germany sent a mighty 
host to hack her way through to the Channel. The French 
brought up their colonials, Senegalese, Turcos and 



126 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

Moroccans, and the British brought Sikhs, Ghurkas and 
other Indian troops from her great eastern empire to fight 
for her on the muddy fields of Flanders. 

The conflict began with a blow against the Belgians 
under the command of their king, Albert, who stood behind 
the Yser river at Nieuport. The Belgians defended their 
ground bravely for several days against far superior num- 
bers of the enemy, until a British fleet standing off at sea 
along the coast threw shells from their heavy guns upon 
the Germans with great slaughter, and stopped their ad- 
vance. Stopped here the Germans moved further inland 
and attacked again near Dixmude, midway between Nieu- 
port and Ypres. Here they pressed the Belgians so hard 
that they opened the sluices and flooded the country. The 
Germans were drowned in great numbers and held back 
by the impassable barrier of water. This closed one phase 
of the Flanders struggle which is known as the Battle of 
the Yser. The Germans were in possession of Ostend 
and Nieuport on the North Sea, but the road to the 
Channel ports on this part of the front was blocked. 

Farther eastward the Germans again renewed the at- 
tack, this time against the British and French around 
Ypres. They took Dixmude which they had battered to 
a pile of burning ruins, but were held there by the famous 
"Golden Lads" of Brittany. But on and on around Ypres 
the Germans came with a great determination to take the 
mellow old Flemish town and open a road to Calais. The 
slaughter here was beyond realization. The troops on 
both sides fought like demons. Back little by little the 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1914 127 

British bent, throwing in their last men. Every man who 
could hold a gun was sent into the line, down to the laborers 
and the cooks. And the British held and their line was 
not broken. In utter despair at last the Germans gave up. 
It is said that with one more attack they would have 
broken through and opened the road to Calais. The last 
man had gone into the fray when the Germans gave it up 
as a hopeless task. When they told a German colonel, 
who was captured, that the British had sent in their re- 
serves to the last man, he wept. Victory was in the very 
hands of the German command, and was lost because they 
did not dare to take the last chance. The Battle of Ypres 
had been won by that indomitable stubbornness of the 
British which did not know when it was beaten. Not since 
Waterloo had British manhood written such a glorious 
page in the military annals of the nation as it wrote in the 
first Battle of Ypres. 

The Channel ports were safe. The road that Ger- 
many had hoped to open on which to reach them was 
blocked for good and all. She had shed unspeakable 
quantities of blood to no purpose. The armies from the 
North Sea to the borders of Switzerland were now in a 
deadlock that was to last for two years. The two great 
German efforts on the western front had failed. The drive 
on Paris had ended in a crushing defeat which in the end 
caused Germany to lose the war. The drive for Calais 
had been stopped in its tracks because of exhaustion and 
despair. The German General Staff turned its face to- 
wards Russia in the east. 



128 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

On the Eastern Front 
The Invasion of East Prussia 

Contrary to the belief of Germany, Russia completed 
the mobilization of her armies in a short time. Germany 
threw all of her available strength into Belgium and 
France which left her eastern frontier without sufficient 
protection. It showed, too, how little the Germans feared 
the military power of the Slav empire. But Russia sprung 
a surprise upon the Teutons, and sent two armies to in- 
vade East Prussia. The first army under General Ren- 
nenkampf met and defeated the Germans under General 
von Fran9ois at Insterburg on August 16th, and advanced 
to the gates of Koenigsberg, to which they laid siege. The 
second army under General Samsonov pushed westward 
across the northern end of the Masurian Lakes and de- 
feated the Germans at a place called Frankenau. The 
success of the Russians alarmed the Kaiser very much, 
and he called from retirement an aged veteran of the 
Franco-Prussian war, General von Hindenburg, to com- 
mand an army in East Prussia and drive the Russians out. 
Von Hindenburg had made a special study of East Prus- 
sian territory, and especially of the Masurian Lakes dis- 
trict, to deal with just such an invasion as the Russians 
had made. So the German General Staff raised as large 
an army as they could, drawing from the western front to 
do so, and sent von Hindenburg to deal with the Russians 
in East Prussia. 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1914 129 

General Rennenkampf with the Army of the Niemen 
was investing Koenigsberg in the north. General Sam- 
sonov after his victory at Frankenau pushed on through 
the lake region of forest and marsh towards AUenstein. 
He had about 200,000 men, but owing to the conditions of 
the country they were separated on the march. On 
Wednesday, August 26th, von Hindenburg met the scat- 
tered Russian forces and everywhere drove in their ad- 
vance guards. In a seven-day battle the Russians were 
finally beaten near the town of Tannenberg close to the 
JSIasurian marshes, after which the battle takes its name. 
This victory, reaching Berlin on the anniversaiy of the 
Battle of Sedan, was the first decisive one the Germans 
had won in the war, and the empire was thrilled from end 
to end. Von Hindenburg became the national hero, and 
the Emperor made him a Field Marshal and commander 
of all the German armies in the east. 

After his victory at Tannenberg, the triumphant von 
Hindenburg sought to destroy the Russian army under 
General Rennenkampf who, on hearing the news of Sam- 
sonov's disaster, retreated behind the river Niemen in 
Russia. Here he received large reenforcements and 
waited for the Germans. They came, and began to build 
bridges on which to cross over and attack. But as fast 
as the bridges were built, the Russians hidden in their 
trenches would blow them up. This was repeated a num- 
ber of times until von Hindenburg gave the order to 
retreat. Leaving the river Niemen the Germans had to 
pass through the forest of Augustovo which put them in a 



130 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

difficult position for defense. The Russians immediately 
pursued and attacked the retreating Germans. They were 
badly defeated, losing 60,000 men in killed, wounded and 
prisoners. 

The Russian Invasion of Galicia 

The East Prussian venture was only a secondary in- 
terest to the Russians. Their real thrust was in the south 
through Galicia, where they hoped to break the Austrian 
power. It was necessary to keep the Germans busy in 
the north so they could not come to the aid of their ally. 
Yon Hindenburg had unsuspectingly fallen in with this 
arrangement. 

By the middle of August Russia had three armies mov- 
ing towards the Austrian province of Galicia. The first 
was under General Ivanoff starting from its base at 
Brest-Litovsk, passing by Lublin to the frontier by the 
Yistula river, to the northwest of the Galician capital, 
Lemberg. This army was intended to block the unpro- 
tected gap between the Yistula and Chohn through which 
the Austrians might advance to turn north and attack 
Warsaw in the rear. The second army under General 
Russky started from Rovno in the Russian province of 
Yolhynia, advanced along the Kiev-Lemberg railroad 
straight upon Lemberg. The third army under General 
Brusiloff came up from the Roumanian border and crossed 
the frontier at Tarnopol. 

General Ivanoff was opposed by an Austrian army 
under General Dankl before whom he retired to lure him 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1914 131 

deep into Russian territory. Generals Russky and 
Brusiloff joined forces before Lemberg, which was de- 
fended by the Austrians under General Auff enberg. The 
Austrians were disastrously defeated and went fleeing over 
the Carpathian passes into Hungary. They lost beside 
the killed and wounded 250,000 prisoners, hundreds and 
hundreds of guns, and great quantities of supplies. The 
Russians triumphantly took possession of the important 
city of Lemberg. 

The defeat of the Austrians at Lemberg left the army 
of General Dankl that had pursued the Russians under 
General Russky across the Russian frontier in a perilous 
position. The Russians attacked and sent the Austrians 
reeling back into Galicia. It did not stop until it came 
near to Cracow close to the Silesian border of Germany, 
The Russians surged into the Carpathian passes, sending 
some Cossacks to raid the Hungarian plains. General 
Russky left troops to besiege Przemysl which fell early 
in the spring of the next year, and pushed on westward 
across the San river to the city of Cracow which the Rus- 
sians bombarded at the beginning of December. The Rus- 
sians were now in control of Galicia, the Austrian armies 
beaten and disorganized. Germany was compelled to 
come to the aid of her aUy. Her first step was in starting 
an advance upon Warsaw in Russian Poland. 

The Capture of Lodz and the Struggle for Warsaw 

Von Hindenburg now went south from East Prussia 
to bolster up the broken Austrian armies. His first aim 



132 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

was to attack Warsaw and thus draw Russian troops out 
of Galicia. This would give the Austrians an opportunity 
to advance upon a much weakened foe. German troops 
had been placed south as far as Cracow. On October first, 
two German armies, one of which was largely composed 
of Austrians and which together did not number more than 
six Army Corps, advanced from the southwest towards 
AVarsaw. The more northern army on October 14th, had 
reached the outskirts of the city, seven miles away; the 
other army advanced to the west bank of the Vistula 
river before Ivangorod, the strong fortress southeast of 
Warsaw. The Germans began dropping shells into the 
city; airplanes flew over, and bombed it; the population 
began to leave. It looked certain to all the world that 
Warsaw would fall into the hands of the .Germans. Von 
Hindenburg, however, stood before the city a week with- 
out making any great effort to take it. In the meantime 
his Austrian allies who were before Ivangorod had suf- 
fered a reverse. So, on October 21st, he began to retreat 
from the city. Von Hindenburg, however, had justified 
his plan of relieving the Austrians in Galicia. The pres- 
sure on Przemysl had been relieved; the Russians had 
retired behind the river San ; and it looked as if the Aus- 
trians might reconquer Galicia. But the hope was only 
short lived, for as soon as the Germans retired from War- 
saw, the Russians again took up the offensive in Galicia, 
recrossed the river San, encircled Przemysl and once more 
stood before Cracow. The situation looked even more 
dangerous for the Austrians than before, and compelled 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1914 133 

von Hindenburg to make a second effort to capture the 
Polish capital. On his first retreat from Warsaw, von 
Hindenburg had gone southwest leaving the city of Lodz, 
after it was captured by the Germans in the opening days 
of the war, to fall into the hands of the Russians. It was 
around this city that a terrific battle took place between 
the Russians and the Germans which lasted for six weeks 
during a second advance towards Warsaw. 

From Cracow to Kalisz, directly opposite Lodz, the 
Austrians advanced upon the city. Between Thorn and 
the Vistula river in the north, von Hindenburg sent for- 
ward General von Mackensen in a southeasterly direction 
upon Lodz. Another army crossed the Polish frontier 
from the direction of Posen towards the city. The troops 
under General von Mackensen got to the rear of the Rus- 
sians under General Russky and stood between them and 
Warsaw. The Russians were in a desperate situation 
and it looked as if they would be destroyed and the city 
taken. Another Russian army came to the help of Russky 
and soon the tables were turned by several German corps 
being trapped. They in turn, however, escaped, but did so 
largely through the failure of General Rennenkampf to 
assist General Russky at the right moment. The Germans 
in the meantime had called reenforcements from the west, 
which reached the battlefield in the first week of December 
and heavily turned the scale against the Russians, enabling 
von Hindenburg on December 6th, after six weeks of 
bloody fighting, to capture Lodz. With Lodz in their 
hands, the Germans began a terrific frontal attack upon 



134 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

Warsaw. The armies were now in an almost straight Hne 
running from the PoHsh boundary south to the Vistula 
river about midway between Lodz and Warsaw, but after 
a tremendous effort, von Hindenburg's attacks died down ; 
and the end of the year found a third attempt for the 
capture of Warsaw at a standstill. 

The important result of this campaign had been to 
check the Austrian capture of Cracow, and the advance 
into German Silesia. The Russians, however, stood in 
the Carpathian passes ready to sweep down in great num- 
bers upon the Hungarian Plains ; but the campaign in the 
east at the close of the year ended very much as it did 
on the western front, with the armies facing each other 
and unable to make progress. 

The Austrian Defeat in Serbia 

At the time the Germans were making their desperate 
attacks upon Warsaw after the capture of Lodz, and 
when the campaign in Galicia had come to a halt, the Rus- 
sians turned their attention to little Serbia. Inmiediately 
after the war began, the Austrians had invaded the Httle 
country but were promptly defeated at Jedar. After 
that, the Austrians were too busy in fighting the Russians 
in Galicia to pay much attention to the little Slav nation. 
Now that their German ally was holding all of Russia's 
great strength in the struggle for Warsaw, the Austrians 
dispatched an army to invade Serbia. The advance be- 
gan on December first. 

The Austrian troops crossed the Danube in three 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1914 135 

columns, the right wing coming from Bosnia in the west 
and meeting the center, captured Belgrade after a severe 
bombardment. The left moving on to Uchitza on the 
Serbian IMorava, completed the occupation of all the north- 
east corner of Serbia between the rivers Save and Drina. 
The object of the Austrians was to reach Nish, the 
temporary Serbian capital, and thus command the Orient 
Railway to Bulgaria, which, it was supposed, would very 
much influence that country to enter the war on the side 
of the Teutons. News, however, of the Russian Cossacks 
sweeping down into the Hungarian Plains, caused the 
Austrians to withdraw some troops to help meet this situa- 
tion. No sooner had the Austrians weakened their forces 
than the Serbians took the offensive and attacked a place 
called Valiero, and disastrously defeated the Austrians. 
One of the worst routs of the war followed. In headlong 
disorder, the Austrians retreated from Serbian soil, suf- 
fering tremendous losses. By the middle of December, 
Serbia was free of the enemy and once again the Serbs 
were back in their capital at Belgrade. It was the second 
great victory they had won from the Austrians within four 
months after the beginning of the war. They were not to 
know the taste of battle again for nearly a year, when Aus- 
trians, Germans, and Bulgarians combined, invaded and 
overran the country. 

The Conflict Reaches Asia 

We have followed the battles in the more important 
areas of the war. The nations in Europe had leaped at 



136 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

each other's throats the moment the war began, and both 
on the western and eastern fronts the intensest struggles 
took place during the four months before the cold weather 
set in to stop the fighting. But the war reached out all 
this while into Asia and Africa, and though not conducted 
on the same large scale as in Europe, was still important. 
The entry of Turkey into the war, through the bombard- 
ment of Russian Black Sea ports by the German war- 
ships, Goben and Breslmi, which had taken refuge in the 
Dardanelles from the pursuit of British and French war- 
ships in the Mediterranean, started the hostilities in Asia. 
The Turks had proclaimed a Holy War in which all the 
believers in the Mohammedan religion were to rise up 
against the Europeans. The success of the Holy War by 
the Mohammedans would have been chiefly to the ad- 
vantage of Germany, as it was through her influence upon 
Turkey that the Holy War was proclaimed. Its ad- 
vantage to Germany would have been in the Moham- 
medans killing and driving out the English from their 
colonial possessions in the east. It was the first instance 
in a very, very long while in which a Holy War had been 
proclaimed; and while there was much uneasiness felt 
among the English, it really came to nothing. England, 
however, now that Turkey was in the war and thus open- 
ing a path for the German armies into Asia, had to pro- 
tect her dominions. It was necessary for her to keep the 
Suez Canal from destruction, and also to throw a barrier 
across Mesopotamia to prevent an invasion of her Indian 
empire. Russia also was confronted with a similar prob- 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1914 137 

lem in protecting her interests in the east. So in Asia the 
English had to fight a campaign in Mesopotamia, and the 
Russians in the Caucasus and Persia. 

The Russians sent a body of troops across the north- 
west of Persia early in November and occupied the town 
of Bayazid close to Mt. Ararat. Another detachment 
entered Kurdestan to advance upon Van, while still an- 
other Russian detachment occupied the town of Karakilisa, 
where they were held by the Turks. The great struggle, 
however, between Russia and Turkey was to take place 
in Transcaucasia where the boundaries of the Russian and 
Turkish empires meet. On the Russian side was the great 
fortress of Kars which the Turks desired to capture; and 
on the Turkish side was the great stronghold of Erezem, 
in Armenia, which the Russians desired to capture. The 
Russian army under the command of General Wormzor 
did battle with the Turkish army under General Enver 
Pasha at Khorasan, and utterly defeated it on New 
Year's Day, 1915. This victory left the Russians un- 
molested in the Caucasus to prepare for their advance into 
Armenia, which was later done under the command of 
Grand Duke Nicholas. 

In the meantime, the British had started an advance 
from the Persian Gulf up the Tigris river. They ad- 
vanced without much opposition to the town of Kurna at 
the junction of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, which 
they attacked and captured on the ninth of December. 
About three hundred miles up the Tigris from Kurna, was 
Bagdad, the city of magic, which the British hoped t6 



138 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

reach; but the fulfillment of that hope was still far ahead 
of them. We must now leave the British on the Tigris and 
turn our attention for the moment to the futile effort of 
the Turks to reach the Suez Canal. 

A force of some 65,000 men under the command of 
General Djemal Pasha was sent by the Turks to cut the 
Suez Canal. It was a very difficult task, for the Turkish 
army to approach the Canal, because they had to cross a 
desert to do so, with no water supply and no railways to 
transport munitions or food. Nor could motor transports 
cross this desert to replace the lack of railway transporta- 
tion. A force of British troops, under the command of 
Major General Sir John Maxwell, was ordered to pro- 
tect the canal. In October a small force of Bedouins, a 
roving Arab tribe, was reported near the Canal. These 
the British ran down and drove away towards the end of 
November. Of all the Turkish troops, 65,000 strong, 
which started out to reach the Canal, only 12,000 men 
finally arrived in its vicinity, and not until the beginning 
of February in 1915. Nearly the whole force was killed 
and captured so that the only Turks who were near the 
Canal were those who had escaped and were roaming about 
as fugitives. The battle for the Suez Canal thus ended. 
Egypt was saved from invasion, and the connecting link of 
England's water route to the east was safe and secure. 

We have only to go further east across Asia to the 
Pacific to mention another campaign in the closing weeks 
of the year, which was like a burning fragment tossed out 
of Europe's conflagration. And if we turn south from 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1914 139 

the Suez Canal to the lower part of Africa, we shall find 
still another burning fragment that fell from the burning 
house of Europe. 

Let us first see what the Japanese were doing on the 
Pacific. No sooner had Germany refused by her silence 
to turn over her colony of Chiou-chau in China to the 
Japanese, than Japan declared war and proceeded to take 
this place. She landed an expedition of Japanese troops 
which were later joined by some 1500 British troops near 
Chiou-chau and commenced to advance early in Septem- 
ber upon Tsing-tau, a strong German city and railroad 
center at the end of the peninsula. A fleet of British and 
Japanese ships stood out at sea and bombarded Tsing- 
tau to cover the Japanese advance. The Germans had 
the city encircled by miles of barbed wire entanglements 
and heavily fortified with big guns; but the Japanese in 
their usual systematic manner proceeded to creep upon the 
city. Their advance was very slow as they had many 
difficult obstacles to overcome ; but finally, after nearly six 
weeks of fighting, Tsing-tau surrendered with a garrison 
of four thousand German troops. 

The Japanese warships had seized the .German islands 
in the South Pacific, and as the New Zealanders had taken 
Samoa and the Australians Kaiser Wilhelm's Land, the 
Germans lost all of their colonies in the east. 

Now in South Africa a campaign had been begun to 
capture the German colonies. Before the South Africans 
could attempt to do this, however, they had to suppress a 
rebelhon under the leadership of General De Wet, one of 



140 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

the leaders in the Boer War of 1899. He had never be- 
come reconciled to the rule of England and at the outbreak 
of the war he thought he saw an opportunity to begin a 
successful revolt ; — but General Louis Botha, another one 
of the famous Boer leaders of 1899, was faithful to the 
English government and soon had suppressed De Wet's 
rebellion, making its leader a prisoner. 

While this revolution was going on, the Germans in 
southwest Africa invaded British South Africa; but the 
Boers rallied around Botha as their leader and began the 
invasion of German Southwest Africa. The conquest of 
German Southwest Africa was, however, owing to the 
wild nature of the country in which it was easy for troops 
to evade each other, a difficult and prolonged task. It 
took Botha well into the middle of the following year be- 
fore the last German commander surrendered, but July, 
1915, saw the whole of German Southwest Africa in pos- 
session of the South African Republics. 

Another German colony in Africa, Togoland, was 
more speedily conquered by Anglo-French forces by the 
end of August, 1914. The Cameroons, another German 
possession in Africa, was conquered by the British and 
French together early in 1915. Only German East Africa 
now was left; and this was the most difficult of all the 
German possessions to overcome. The struggle here went 
on until the last year of the war, but it, too, finally suc- 
cumbed ; and Germany was entirely driven out of Africa, 
as she had been driven out of the Far East. 

These minor areas of the conflict, so far away from 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1914 141 

where the war started, saw the ambitious structure of the 
German empire collapse and vanish. Indeed the end of 
1914 saw failure attending all the mighty and confident 
blows of Germany's military machine. Beaten at the 
Marne, and in Flanders, held in the East by the Russian 
mass, her ally's armies crushed and disorganized by re- 
peated defeats in Gahcia and Serbia, she was in a decidedly 
bad position. The Germans thought the war would be 
won by them in three or four months, for did not the 
Kaiser promise the troops when they were driving into 
Belgium, that they would be home in Berlin by Christmas, 
celebrating their victories? Instead the end of 1914 
showed the Germans, at least, that for them the war had 
just begun; and we will see in the campaign for the next 
year how true this was. 



CHAPTER II 

the campaigns of 1915 

On the Western Front 

Battles of Neuve-Chapelle, YpreSj Loos, Champagne 

THE year 1915 opened with the armies on the 
western front deadlocked in trench warfare. 
Fighting in the open was now a thing of the past 
as far as the armies in France and Flanders were con- 
cerned. A new situation demanded new methods of at- 
tack as well as new weapons to make them. Two factors 
became necessary to carry on a successful action. These 
were the development of high explosive shells in battering 
down trench works and an increased use of machine guns 
to repulse infantry attacks. Thus artillery became steadily 
more important. And to feed the guns with an enormous 
supply of ammunition was imperative. The Germans had 
already taken these things into account. The French, too, 
were not slow to meet the new demands which the fighting 
called for. The British, however, had to learn the need 
by bitter experience. They still clung to the use of 
shrapnel shells almost to the point of folly ; and it was only 
after a great controversy at home, that the British War 
Office was compelled to supply the high explosives which 
their generals at the front demanded. So the nations be- 

142 




Painting hv Cvrus Cvnco 

By arrangement 7i'illi Jarrold & Sons. Ltd. 



THE "MOPPERS UP" LEFT NOTHING ALIVE BEHIND THEM 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1915 143 

gan in feverish haste to manufacture high explosive shells 
in great quantities and to multiply the great number of 
guns they were to feed. 

The year opened with a small French attack in Cham- 
pagne, north of Soissons, and again in February, the 
French attacked on a narrow front east of Argonne and 
in sight of the Cathedral of Rheims on the west. These 
attacks, however, were but faint outbursts. It was not 
until the first part of March that an advance of any im- 
portance took place. In this advance, the British fought 
the Battle of Neuve-Chapelle between Lille and La 
Bassee. The object of this attack was to capture Aubers 
Ridge, a commanding position for future advance. The 
Battle of Neuve-Chapelle saw the first use of massed artil- 
lery bombardment, which the Germans called "Drum- 
Fire." The method was to mass artillery on a narrow front 
and pour great quantities of shells into the enemy's lines, 
destroy the enemy's trenches, and open a way for the 
infantry to advance. The British attempt, however, 
merely showed what might be accomplished. They did not 
have the ammunition to follow up an initial success, and 
so did not reach the second line of German trenches, being 
repulsed by terrific machine gun fire. In this engagement, 
they had opened the way to Lille, but could not go 
through. They gained a mile of territory and 2,000 Ger- 
man prisoners but suffered a loss of 13,000 casualties. 
The battle was the first unheeded warning of the difficulty 
of frontal attacks in trench warfare, a warning that was 



144 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

repeated in nearly all the battles they fought on the west- 
ern front during the year. 

Early in April the French advancing north from Toul 
and south from Verdun attempted to clear the Germans 
out of the St. Mihiel salient which penetrated into their 
lines threateningly in the bend at the frontier in the east. 
They failed to move the Germans, and all during the war 
the St. JMihiel salient remained like a thorn in the French 
lines until the Americans in a brilliant attack wiped it out 
in September, 1918. 

On April 22d the Germans began the second Battle of 
Ypres. This lasted for five days of terrible fighting. The 
second Battle of Ypres will always be memorable for the 
first use of poison gas. The German attack was a new 
effort to open the road to Calais; and they believed that 
with their poison gas they would succeed. The point of 
attack was where the French and British lines formed, and 
was held by Canadian troops and a contingent of French 
colonials. The troops saw coming down upon them a mass 
of vapor. It was a most unusual sight, but not for an 
instant did they think of it as a devilish poison which would 
burn and choke them to death. Totally unprepared to 
meet the death-dealing fumes, they were overcome. A 
number of the Canadian troops had the hardihood to at- 
tack right through the vapor. It was the swiftness of the 
men that saved them, as they came out on the other side of 
the gas clouds upon astonished and unprepared Germans. 
But the gas had done its deadly work. The French colo- 
nials on the right of the Canadians broke and fled. The 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1915 145 

Canadians fought bravely as they choked and gasped 
but in such a condition they were unable to stop the on- 
coming enemy. A lieutenant with burning lungs and 
choking throat, heroically groped his way back and made 
his superior officer understand what had taken place. He 
dropped and died in great agony when this was done. Re- 
enforcements were rushed up to the agonized troops, and 
the gap opened by the deadly poison gas was filled, and 
the enemy stopped; but the Canadians had to retreat, be- 
cause when the French colonials broke under the gas at- 
tack, it left them exposed. 

The Germans gained much ground, many prisoners, 
and much material ; but the second Battle of Ypres ended 
with the city still in the hands of the British and the path- 
way to Calais still blocked. 

During the next two months, there was much fighting 
of a minor character along the line between the Somme 
and Ypres, the most important being General Foch's at- 
tempt to reach Vimy Ridge. These engagements were 
known as the Battle of Artois. The importance was only 
local, however, and it was not until September that the 
British and French undertook offensives on any consider- 
able scale. 

The autumn offensive of the British and French was 
an attack from two widely separated points, at the north 
and in the east, with the intention of penetrating the Ger- 
man lines and forcing a retirement in the huge salient. 
The British attacked between La Bassee and Loos with 
the object of capturing Lens. Cooperating with the Brit- 



146 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

ish at this point were the French under General Foch. 
The French under General Petain were to attack in the 
Champagne with Vouziers, a railroad center behind the 
German lines, as an objective. Both attacks opened on 
September 25th with the greatest artillery bombardment 
of the war up to this time. The success of the French in 
the Champagne was the greatest yet known since trench 
warfare came into existence. The French broke into sec- 
ond line entrenchments. A Moroccan detachment broke 
through the entire German position, but, without support, 
was cut to pieces. The Germans became thoroughly 
alarmed at the progress of the French and began to draw 
reserves from various parts of the western front. After 
fighting many days, the attack began to slow down as the 
French losses became very great. The result was that the 
French had advanced for a mile and a half or two miles 
on a front of fifteen miles. The losses, however, on both 
sides were very great, though the French had taken 25,- 
000 prisoners and 150 guns with large quantities of ammu- 
nition. It was a big victory and the French were very 
much elated, though its effect upon the whole situation on 
the western front was small. 

Turning to the north where the British were to act in 
harmony with the French advance in Champagne, we meet 
with entirely different results. General Foch, as you 
know, was on the right of the British, under Sir John 
French, who was to move forward at Loos. His duty was 
to keep a pressure on the Germans in front of him in 
Artois so as to prevent the withdrawal of troops to reen- 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1915 147 

force other parts of their line. The British, as at Neuve- 
Chapelle, broke the German hne at Loos, but were unpre- 
pared to take advantage of it. The troops under General 
Foch attacked on September 25th, and advanced to the top 
of Vimy Ridge to which the Germans still clung. 

Now turning to the British who attacked on the same 
day as Petain's army in Champagne and Foch's army in 
Artois, we find them meeting with early successes. They 
captured the Hohenzollern Redoubt, an intricate and diffi- 
cult maze of concrete trenches and wire entanglements. 
Further to the south, the Scottish Highlanders entering 
Loos continued on, captured the slopes of Hill 70, stand- 
ing ready to descend and advance upon Lens. But at this 
point, the fruits of the British success vanished. The Ger- 
mans retook all that the British had gained, because the 
latter had not been prepared to follow up their successes. 
The British commander. Sir John French, had to appeal 
to General Foch for help as he had done before during 
the battle in Flanders. In the Battle of Loos, the British 
took 3,000 prisoners and 25 guns ; but they had lost more 
than 60,000 men. The Battle of Loos was the worst ex- 
perience that the British army had known since the war 
had begun. It lost for Sir John French his command of 
the British forces. The British were not to retrieve their 
military prestige until the Battle of the Sonmie which be- 
gan nearly a year later. 

On the Eastern Front 
We will now turn to the eastern front where Germany 



148 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

made a great effort to gain a decision. By the end of 
1915, the Russian armies, in spite of the three drives for 
Warsaw, remained in control of GaHcia, and the Austrian 
armies were powerless to move them. With the new year, 
the Russians began in earnest to get over the Carpathian 
IMountains. In JNIarch and April they made a gigantic 
effort to clear the two most westerly passes, the Dukla and 
the Lupkow. While on these snow-covered trails, and 
suffering keenly from the cold, the Russians fought with 
great endurance. It was necessary for them to make haste 
if they were going to descend and invade the Hungarian 
plains, because the Germans and Austrians were begin- 
ning to come through on the more southern passes to the 
Galician foothills, where they attacked the Russians in the 
rear. The Battle of the Carpathians was most costly 
to the Russians, who, in spite of their great resources in 
men, could not keep up their reenforcements, nor spare 
the guns and ammunition which were necessary to bring 
success. The mountains themselves more than the Aus- 
trian armies held the Russians back. They were a wall 
against which the Russians battered their heads. 

In the meantime, Przemysl, which had stood siege since 
the previous autumn, surrendered to the Russians on 
March 22d. This success, however, scarcely made up for 
the disaster that overtook the Russians in the Battle of 
the Masurian Lakes. The Austro- Germans in January 
had crossed into Bukowina and drove the Russians out. 
The purpose of this invasion was largely to keep Roumania 
neutral, Russia sought to offset this Austro-German sue- 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1915 149 

cess by another invasion of East Prussia. The Russians 
coming from the north and south sought to drive the Ger- 
mans out from their strong position west of the Masurian 
Lakes. Von Hindenburg, however, who knew this region 
like a book, tricked the Russians to their ruin. He lured 
them on and then drove them into the marshy and woody 
districts of the lake regions, and attacked them with terrific 
force, cutting the Russians to pieces. Thousands of Rus- 
sians were captured in this battle and those who escaped 
retreated across the frontier, hard pressed by the Ger- 
mans, to the protection of their fortresses at Kovno, 
Grodno, and Ossowiec. East Prussia was now clear of 
Russians for good. After this victory, von Hindenburg 
made an unsuccessful attempt from the north to advance 
upon Warsaw; but the Polish capital was yet beyond his 
reach. 

We must now follow the course of the greatest battle 
of the war since the Battle of the Marne. It began on 
May Day, 1915, and entirely changed the whole course of 
events on the eastern front. Only four battles of the en- 
tire war surpassed it in magnitude. They were the Battle 
of Verdun, the Battle of the Somme, the Battle of the last 
German Offensive, and Foch's Battle of "two blows and a 
kick" which began on July 18th and ended with the sign- 
ing of the Armistice, November 11, 1918. 

The battle which began on the first of May, 1915, was 
to do more than change the whole course of military events 
in the East. Out of this disaster was born the Russian 
Revolution nearly two years later, which overthrew the 



150 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

Imperial House of Romanoff. In fact, though no one 
could read it at the time, it spelled the doom of Russia as 
a great empire. The Battle of the Dunajec saw the rising 
of the star of one of the few great German generals the 
war produced. General von Mackensen, whom von Hin- 
denburg had given an important task in the first drive 
upon Warsaw, was put in command of the German army 
that began its drive through Galicia. Fully 2,000 guns 
opened fire into the Russian lines to prepare for the ad- 
vance of Mackensen's phalanx. This battering ram fairly 
destroyed the Russian army of General Dimitrieff, which 
stood opposite. On either side of Dimitrieff 's army stood 
the army of General Evarts on the north of the Vistula 
river and behind the Nida river. To the south was Gen- 
eral Brusiloff's army which had victoriously held the 
Dukla and Lupkow Passes in the Carpathian Mountains. 
Both these northern and southern armies during the early 
stages of von Mackensen's advance were immovable, but 
the destruction of Dimitrieff's army in the center made it 
impossible for them to hold their positions. The German 
advance was fast getting into Brusiloff's rear and cutting 
off his line of retreat. It seemed as if he would be trapped 
in the Carpathian INIountains and destroyed. Indeed, the 
Germans all but enveloped the Russians to the south. 
Only the Russian reserves coming out from Przemysl, 
who halted the Germans for a few hours, gave Brusiloff 
an opportunity to escape. He crossed the river San and 
once more repaired the Russian front, on a line with 
Evarts' northern army which had retired from the Nida 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1915 151 

river ; and thus the Russian front was once more restored. 
All the way from the Vistula river along the San through 
Jaroslov and Przemysl and eastward along the Dniester 
river to the Carpathians, the Russians once more pre- 
sented a solid front. The Russians attacked and fought 
the Battle of the San in an effort to beat back the Ger- 
mans, but it was of no avail. Von Mackensen crossed the 
San at Jaroslov, while an Austro-German army came 
down out of the Carpathians in the rear of Przemysl. The 
Russians finding themselves about to be encircled on the 
north and south once more retreated, evacuating Przemysl 
and stood on a line at Grodek, before Lemberg, and from 
here north and northwest to the lower San. The swamps 
and marshes around Grodek made it impossible for von 
Mackensen to move his artillery up to attack Lemberg, 
so he turned north from Jaroslov to Rawa Russka, de- 
feated the Russians there and then turned south towards 
the rear of Lemberg. The Russians gave up the city and 
retired behind the Sereth, and Galicia was freed of all the 
Russian troops. 

In a little over a month Russia had lost what it took 
her many months to gain. Thousands and thousands of 
her soldiers had been killed, and wounded, and taken pris- 
oners. Vast quantities of stores had been captured. But 
more than this, Austria had been saved, and Russian terri- 
tory was now in danger of invasion. No one can deny 
but that General von Mackensen had fought a magnificent 
campaign, one that was planned on a tremendous scale 
and carried out to the least detail with precision. By what 



152 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

he achieved, it was made possible for von Hindenburg to 
begin his fourth drive to capture Warsaw and command 
all of Russian Poland; and now we must move north and 
see von Hindenburg realize success at last. 

The Capture of Warsaw 

Von Hindenburg was now to achieve a triumph more 
important than von JNIackensen's re-capture of Galicia. 
As a mere feat of arms the taking of Warsaw, even if we 
combine all the four attempts, was not equal to the 
splendor and deadliness of von Mackensen's campaign. 
But the latter victory only restored their possessions to 
the Austrians. It is quite true that the effects were deeper 
than this. With the first blast of the guns at the Dunajec 
on May first an empire cracked and the imperial crown 
of the Romanoffs was shaken. But the sound of the crack 
was too faint for men inside or outside of Russia to hear ; 
and the Czar wore his crown in such a fashion as to hide 
its imperial slant. Deep in the roar of guns the forces 
were gathering to product that lightning stroke of revolu- 
tion by which the empire was to be riven and the crown 
hurled into the ruins. 

With the loss of Warsaw Russia was to lose a province 
that was once a kingdom. For over a century Poland, 
broken and trampled, bled with the anguish of her fate. 
Torn limb from limb the bleeding parts barely existed 
under Russian, Prussian and Austrian rule. Grafted upon 
these states the separate parts of Poland could do nothing 
but wail over their unhappy lot. The iron heel of war was 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1915 153 

now turning this wail into agonized cries which reached 
and touched the hearts of mankind over all the world. 

The advantage of all the victories that had so far come 
to the Teutonic arms on the eastern front had been Aus- 
tria's. It was of course to Germany's benefit to keep 
Austria from being crushed and put out of the war; but 
there had yet been no advantage to Germany that would 
help her toward a decision by putting Russia out, and thus 
release her full strength to be thrown against the British 
and French in the west. And this she wished to do before 
the full strength of Great Britain, combined with the 
French, was too great to overcome. So she gathered a 
force to throw against the gates of Warsaw. 

Three immense groups of armies, under the command 
of von Hindenburg who led the first, driving south 
through the Niemen-Narew-Bohr line of fortresses; an- 
other under Prince Leopold of Bavaria came from the 
west to cover the front between Warsaw and the fortress 
of Ivangorod; and a third under von Mackensen came 
north from behind Lublin just east of the Vistula river. 
Three Russian armies opposed, then under the commands 
of Generals Evarts, Ivanoff and Alexiev, with Grand 
Duke Nicholas in supreme command. Thus the two sol- 
diers who were fighting this important battle against each 
other were von Hindenburg and Grand Duke Nicholas. 

The fighting began on July 15th. Von Mackensen 
with the Austrian Archduke Joseph in Command of one of 
his armies, advanced across the frontier upon Lublin in an 
effort to get behind the fortress of Ivangorod. They met 



154 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

with difficulties owing to the poor conditions of the roads 
and lack of railroads. The Archduke forging ahead of 
von Mackensen lost his support and was met at a place 
called Krasnik, where he was badly beaten by the Russians 
under Evarts. Von Mackensen came up to help his gen- 
eral but the Germans were held for a while. It was then 
towards the end of July and the Russians had hopes of 
stopping the Germans from the south. Von Hindenburg, 
however, pushed forward in the north, and in the center, 
where Prince Leopold's armies were coming from the west, 
the Vistula was crossed between Warsaw and Ivangorod. 
The Germans were now in the rear of Warsaw and the city 
was doomed. On August 4th, the Russians evacuated the 
city and Prince Leopold triumphantly entered. 

But could the Russian ai-mies escape? So far von 
Hindenburg had beaten the Grand Duke Nicholas. Von 
Mackensen had taken Lublin on July 30th, and after 
the fall of Warsaw moved northeast towards Brest 
Litovsk as von Hindenburg's armies moved east in an 
eifort to encircle the Russians. The next ten days or two 
weeks was an anxious time for the Russian generals. But 
the skill of Duke Nicholas outwitted the skill of von Hin- 
denburg and von Mackensen and he was able to save his 
armies on the first stage of their retreat. 

No sooner did the Grand Duke accomplish this with 
the hope of making a stand, when a new peril faced him. 
The fortress of Grodno in the north was taken by General 
Below who advanced beyond Vilna. To the south in 
Volhynia the fortresses of Dubno and Lutsk were taken 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1915 155 

by another German army. Once more on both wings the 
Germans had struck to the rear of the Russians and they 
were in danger of being surrounded and captured. The 
Grand Duke had by magnificent work pulled his armies 
out of one trap only to find them in another. Should this 
new trap succeed Russia would be crushed. The territory 
lost, in a sense meant nothing; but should these armies of 
nearly two millions of men be destroyed and captured, 
Russia's military power would be absolutely ruined, and 
she would have to sue for peace. So the Emperor Nicholas 
deposed the Grand Duke, and took personal command of 
the armies himself. 

At Vilna in the north the Russians had been sur- 
rounded but fought their way out of the enemy's grip. 
Brusiloff in the south was stubbornly making an offensive 
which took the fortresses of Lutsk and Dubno away from 
the Germans for a short while. Meantime the Russian 
armies in the center were retiring and reached a position 
in front of the Pripet marshes, a vast swampy track which 
afforded them protection. Once more the Russians were 
saved. The Germans had failed to take Riga on the gulf 
of that name in the extreme north. From Riga behind 
the Dvina river to Dvinsk south through Pinsk in front 
of the Pripet marshes and on to the fortress of Rovno 
behind the Sereth river near the Gahcian border, the Rus- 
sian armies, shattered and worn after more than six 
weeks of disastrous fighting, were intact. Winter now 
about to set in made further military operations impossible. 

The Germans had taken Warsaw and penetrated hun- 



156 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

dreds of miles into Russian territory. They had killed the 
Russians by thousands and captured still more thousands. 
Great quantities of supplies and ammunition had fallen 
into their hands. They had demoralized the Russians' 
military organization. But they had not won a decision 
in the field. The two great campaigns on the eastern 
front, von Mackensen's drive through Galicia beginning 
May 1st, and von Hindenburg's through Poland and Rus- 
sia beginning July 5th, had put Russia in a helpless con- 
dition for the time being. She could bring no aid to the 
Allies by engaging the Austrians and Germans in the east, 
for some time to come. In face of her defeats, the Rus- 
sian government declared its purpose to stay in the war 
until the end. The Germans not being able to crush her 
hopelessly on the battlefield, tried another method which 
was much more successful. And the fruits of it came in 
the form of the Revolution nearly two years later. 

Gallipoli the Tragic 

The world awoke one morning towards the end of 
February, 1915, to hear the echoes of the great guns on 
the French and British battleships roaring at the mouth 
of the Dardanelles. It knew those echoes meant a great 
adventure, but how tragic that adventure would be no 
one could foresee. Only the world was thrilled because it 
believed that those thunderous guns, belching death and 
destruction upon the Turkish forts, were a prophecy of 
the fall of Constantinople. The Turks captured the city 
in the thirteenth century under Mohammed II and have 




Painting by Edgar F. Wittmack 
Courtesy of the " Scientific American " 



© Munn & Co.. Inc. 



THE THrXDER OF THE BRITISH GUNS AWOKE THE ECHOES OF THE 

DARDANELLES 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1915 157 

held it ever since. Here the oldest existing Christian 
church, St. Sophia, was located; the Crusaders had oc- 
cupied the city for a number of years, and many Christian 
nations desired to have it under Christian rule. The his- 
tory of the Turks since they made Constantinople the 
capital of their empire was one long series of cruel 
tyrannies over all the Christian peoples whom they ruled 
in Europe and Asia. You can imagine then, how the 
roar of the Allied battleships raining death and destruc- 
tion upon the Turkish forts thrilled the world with a great 
hope — the hope of at last driving the Turk out of Con- 
stantinople and Europe. 

The English Admiral promised to be in Constantinople 
by Easter, but a month after the bombardment began, 
that is by March 18th, and though the ships had gone some 
distance up the Straits towards The Narrows which lead 
into the Sea of Marmora, the attack was a failure. How 
this failure came about you shall learn when we follow the 
course of the navies in the war as we are now following 
the course of the armies. This naval attempt, however, 
was the prelude to the campaign on Gallipoli which was 
chiefly conducted by British troops. It was after the navy 
had failed single-handed that the army was sent to help. 
Soon the navy dropped out altogether for reasons that 
you will learn in due course, and left the army to attempt 
what proved to be an impossible task. A British states- 
man, Winston Churchill, had his imagination aroused by 
the possibility of taking Gallipoli as the approach to Con- 
stantinople, and much against their better judgment, 



158 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

forced the consent of his associates in the British govern- 
ment, to put it through. 

The Peninsula of GalHpoh is a narrow tongue of hilly 
land about fifty-three miles long running from the Gulf of 
Xeros at the European end to Cape Helles between the 
^gean Sea and the Straits of Dardanelles, which is the 
ancient Hellespont of Hero and Leander. Its narrowest 
part is a little to the south of Bulair not far from the 
European end, and is only about three miles across. On 
the eastern side where the Straits open into the Sea of 
Marmora is the town of Gallipoli. Both shores, on the 
sea side and on the Straits decline sharply with sandy 
cliffs rising from one to three hundred feet above the sea. 
Ravines break through these cliffs at irregular distances 
through which the seasonal rains pour into the sea. The 
hilly inland is covered with brushwood. 

The end of the Gallipoli Peninsula from The Nar- 
rows at the northeast to Cape Helles at the southwest is 
like an old boot. From Cape Suvla to Cape Helles along 
the ^gean Sea is a distance of twenty miles ; the base of 
the boot from Sedd-el-Bahr to Kilid Bahr is a distance 
of about ten miles. From Gaba Tepe, across the ankle 
of the boot, to the little town of Maidos at The Narrows 
is less than five miles. From here to the top of the boot 
the width steadily diminishes to a mile and a half. Above 
Maidos in a diagonal line to Suvla Bay on the ^gean Sea 
is a distance of five or six miles. Suvla Bay was brought 
into the area of conflict as a climax of blunder to the 
tragedy of the campaign against Gallipoli. The scene of 



I 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1915 159 

the long weary months of fighting was along those ten or 
eleven miles from Gaba Tepe to the beaches of Cape 
Helles. 

A description of the territory just mentioned will give 
you some idea of the difficulties that confronted the Brit- 
ish troops. And in following the Gallipoli fighting you 
must keep it in mind, and in doing so you will not wonder 
at the failure of these troops to defeat the Turks, but you 
will be thrilled with admiration at the bravery they dis- 
played. 

On the narrow strip of land from Cape Suvla to Cape 
Helles are three dominating hills. The first is Sari Bair, 
seven miles from Cape Suvla, which dominates and is 
nearly a thousand feet high; the second Kilid Bahr, seven 
miles south of Sari Bair, is a long plateau from five to 
seven hundred feet high running inland from the Straits 
to within two miles of the sea on the other side command- 
ing The Narrows; the third is the barren Achi Baba, five 
miles southwest of Kilid Bahr and six miles from Cape 
Helles, which is nearly six hundred feet high, and com- 
mands the beaches at Cape Helles. Around and between 
these hills was a bumpy, sandy land broken with gullies, 
without roads and through which no water ran, exposed to 
the burning sun and the hills planted with howitzers and 
honey-combed with machine guns. The seacoast had only 
two or three places along its entire length where troops 
could land, and the beaches at these places were literally 
covered with barbed wire, and the land behind the beaches 
was mined. 



160 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

This was the GalKpoH where England sent thousands 
of her own and her colonial troops to heroic failure and 
death. They suffered and died among the memories of 
ancient history. Shadowy forms of Homer's great epic 
must have risen to look upon the scene with wonder- 
stricken eyes. What a baby's affair was the long struggle 
of the Greeks for Troy beside this gigantic whirl and roar 
of iron and fire. For Gallipoli was ancient and classic 
ground. In 405 B. C. it was here that the battle of 
^gospotamos was fought when the Spartans defeated the 
Athenians. In 480 B. C. Xerxes and his hordes crossed 
from Asia to conquer Europe; and across this same land 
Alexander the Great went from Europe to conquer Asia. 
At the very mouth of the Straits, where it meets the 
iEgean Sea, was the scene of Leander's swim to ancient 
Abydos and Hero, the same swim that a famous English 
poet, Lord Byron, in a spirit of emulation took a hundred 
years ago. 

The bombardment of the outer forts by the British 
and French warships began on February 25th and ended 
on March 2d. On April 25th the campaign began in earn- 
est with the landing of a British force at Sedd-el-Bahr and 
of the Australians before Gaba Tepe. Some French 
troops under General D'Amade landed on the Asiatic side 
to draw the attention of the Turks from the British attack. 
There were some 12,000 Anzacs, which means Australian, 
New Zealand Army Corps, under the command of Gen- 
eral Sir Ian Hamilton. 

The landing on Gallipoli was foredoomed to failure 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1915 161 

because the British had waited too long to surprise the 
Turks. After the battleships had withdrawn from attack- 
ing the forts the Turks began to prepare their defenses 
in anticipation of a land attack. It was nearly six weeks 
between the naval attack and the landing of troops on 
the peninsula, and in this time the Turks worked hard to 
complete an impregnable series of defensive works. These 
works extended right down to the shore and in the water. 
Not only had the troops to contend with these defenses 
but were under a constant and heavy gun-fire all the while 
they were going ashore. 

Many devices were used to get the troops ashore. One 
of the most hazardous and romantic was a feat that 
imitated that of the Greeks when they took Troy. The 
Greeks made a large wooden horse, hollow inside, which 
was filled with warriors. The curiosity of the Trojans 
led them to pull this great horse within the gates of the 
city from where the Greeks had left it to tempt them to 
do this very thing. Once within the city the Greeks came 
pouring out of the horse's stomach, attacked and over- 
came the surprised Trojans, and opened the gates for 
their comrades to enter and subdue the city. Well, in 
emulation of this trick, the British loaded a great trans- 
port, the S. S. River Clyde, with troops and ran her ashore 
on the beach at Sedd-el-Bahr. 

Once the troops got ashore they fought with their backs 
against the water merely to hold on to the land. It was 
fully thirty hours after the British landed on the beaches 
at Sedd-el-Bahr before they could even begin an advance. 



162 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

Their object was to take the heights of Achi Baba, as it 
was the object of the Australians from Anzac Beach be- 
fore Gaba Tepe, to advance and take the heights of Sari 
Bahr. But after months of heart-breaking efforts, per- 
formed with the greatest heroism, the troops made Httle 
or no headway. The British losses were terrible. The 
killed amounted to 25,000, the wounded to 75,000, while 
the climate was so bad that nearly 100,000 men were forced 
into the hospital from sickness and disease. 

After such a disastrous failure against which all Eng- 
land protested, and Australia and New Zealand mourned 
because of the horror they knew their sons to be suffering, 
you would suppose that the Birtish would give up the 
venture. But this she was not willing to do without one 
more effort to overcome the Turks. So during the first 
week in August, another force was landed at Suvla Bay, 
four miles above Anzac Cove. 

This force was to advance eastward to the Anafarta 
range behind the heights of Sari Bahr and cut the Turks' 
line of communications. At the same time the British were 
to attack before Achi Baba, and the Australians before 
Sari Bahr. The Turks were celebrating the Ramadan, 
an observance by the Mohammedans of the time when the 
first revelation came to Mohammed, and so were taken by 
surprise. Unlike the landings at Gaba Tepe and Sedd- 
el-Bahr, the landing at Suvla Bay was attended by no 
difficulties. But after the landing, delays undid all that 
was accomplished. The officers hesitated, and all was lost. 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1915 163 

A half-hearted attempt to advance was finally made but it 
was too late, and the whole effort came to nothing. 

At last the British government gave up the attempt 
to take Gallipoli. On December 19th, after nearly five 
months at Suvla Bay, the troops were safely withdrawn. 
On the next day the Anzacs had abandoned Anzac Cove, 
and by January 9th, the last man on Gallipoli embarked at 
Cape Helles and the tragic campaign was over. What 
had taken place in the Gallipoli campaign was the five 
battles of The Landings which hereafter in the history of 
the British empire will remain among the most gallant and 
tragic in its military annals. On the surface the venture 
was an absolute loss, but the campaign had a value in 
keeping Turkish troops from being sent to Mesopotamia 
to strengthen the Turkish resistance against the British 
advance and in the Caucasus against the Russians. Beside 
the Turkish loss in killed and wounded was as great if not 
greater than that of the British. 

Though only an episode in the mighty conflict of the 
World War, the fate of the heroic dead who fell upon 
Gallipoli the Tragic will reecho in song and story in the 
times to come like the glorious deeds of Homer's warriors 
among whose ghosts they fell. 

On the Italian Front 

About a month after the British had landed on 
Gallipoli the Italians had entered the war and began 
operations against the Austrians. The campaign on the 
Italian front, however, was of slight importance during 



164 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

the year 1915. Austria commanded all the strong posi- 
tions on the frontier in the north and Italy's purpose was 
merely to block the way there and keep the Austrians from 
sweeping down into the plains of Lombardy and Venetia, 
while the greatest effort was made to advance towards the 
east, across the Isonzo river into Austria-Hungary. 

The Italian troops immediately advanced north into 
the Trentino and covered the Austrian positions. The 
bulk of the army, however, moved east, crossed the Isonzo 
river to Monfalcone a few miles to the northwest of 
Trieste, and further north stood on the western bank of 
the Isonzo before Gradisca and Gorizia, all of which were 
on Austrian territory. Beginning on June 7th for a week 
the Italians attacked on their right wing across the Isonzo 
from Caporetto to the sea. Monfalcone was captured and 
a position within nine miles of Trieste reached. The 
Italians found the Isonzo too strong to cross before Grad- 
isca and the blow there was stopped by the Austrians. On 
June 15th the Italians captured the strong position on 
Monte Nero to the east of Caporetto. General Cadorna's 
armies were in favorable positions but were finding it very 
difficult to force the Austrians back. On July 2d an at- 
tack on a wide front was ordered for the purpose of en- 
circling and capturing Gorizia, the obstacle that stood in 
the path of the Italian advance. The conflict raged with 
continued fury with small advances by the Italians, but 
Gorizia held out. It was over a year later before the city 
was taken. Before the end of the year the Italians had, 
on the southern wing, reached the Carso Plateau, occupied 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1915 165 

San Michele, a strong height dominating the Doberdo 
Plateau, and in the north, on the left wing, stood before 
Tolmino. The armies were now deadlocked, with the 
Italians far to the east, and on their extreme left flank in 
the Carnic Alps holding the passes, as further westward 
in the Trentino they guarded the passage into Venetia 
and Lombardy. It is well to keep in mind the disposition 
of the Italian armies because it was full of danger as we 
shall come to see when the Austrians made their offensive 
between Lago di Garda and the Brenta in 1916, which 
failed, and the Austro-Germans through Caporetto in 
1917, which succeeded. 

The Conquest of Serbia 

As the German campaign in Poland was drawing to 
a close and the Italian campaign became deadlocked, an- 
other campaign was being prepared for by the Germans 
which was to carry the war on a big scale into the Balkans. 
You know of the two unsuccessful attempts made by Aus- 
tria to conquer Serbia. On each of these occasions the 
gallant little nation repelled the invader and sent him in 
headlong flight back over the frontier. But now that Rus- 
sia had been driven out of Galicia, had been deprived of 
her Polish province, and her own territory deeply invaded 
by the enemy, she was helpless to prevent the Germans 
from moving troops to attack on another front. The east- 
ern situation was entirely, for the time being, at any rate, 
under the control of the ^Germans. There remained only 
one more field to be conquered before the mighty military 



166 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

machine of Germany would triumphantly master the whole 
of eastern Europe from the German border to Con- 
stantinople. This was the Balkan field. Serbia was a 
bitter and active enemy; Bulgaria, up to October, 1915, 
was neutral but an ally; Greece was neutral, though the 
government was sympathetic and inactive because help- 
less; Roumania was neutral but opposed to the German 
cause. The immediate task for Germany was to put 
Serbia out of the way, to crush her so she could no longer 
interfere with Austria's aggression in the Balkans. 

The time was now ripe for Germany to undertake the 
conquest of Serbia. The British, as you have just learned, 
failed utterly in their attempt to take Gallipoli and ad- 
vance upon Constantinople. True, a British army was 
marching up the Tigris, but it was still too far away from 
Bagdad to cause any worry. And the Russians in the 
Caucasus had shown no disposition as yet to make a seri- 
ous attempt to advance through Armenia. Turkey, then, 
was in no immediate danger and could hold out until the 
Germans had forged a passage through the Balkans so 
that arms and munitions could be freely transported to the 
needy Ottoman. 

Just as the roar of the big guns began to die down in 
France and Poland, the dense smoke of battle cleared 
away from the frosty air of autumn, and the vast armies 
settled in the trenches to watch and wait through the long 
winter months, the flame and thunder of a brief but terrific 
battle broke out along the Serbian border. General von 
Mackensen who had smashed the Russians at the Dunajec 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1915 167 

and helped von Hindenburg to defeat the same enemy in 
Poland, was in command of a large Austro- German force. 
The Serbs are among the best soldiers in Europe, but the 
brave little army of 150,000 men under Marshal Putnik, 
the Serbian commander, not only faced von Mackensen's 
hosts but the pitiless conditions of the fast approaching 
winter. Though their artillery was inferior to the Ger- 
mans', the Serbians held finely entrenched positions behind 
the rivers Danube and Save. But the roads behind them 
were very poor, the food supplies were scarce, and in case 
of defeat they had no refuge that could be safely reached 
and no aid they could hopefully look for. Added to these 
dangers was the fear of Bulgaria coming into the war and 
attacking them from the west in the rear. 

The boom of von Mackensen's guns began in the latter 
part of September and the shells began to rain upon Bel- 
grade. On October 7th and 11th the Austro-Germans 
crossed the Danube in two armies east and west of Bel- 
grade, and began moving south behind a deluge of shells. 
And just as the Serbs feared, on October 11th, Bulgaria 
sent three armies across the Serbian frontier. This act of 
Bulgaria was the worst treachery of the war with the sin- 
gle exception of the German treachery in Belgium. Poor 
little Serbia was now doomed. Blasted in front and 
stabbed in the back, the heroic little army of Marshal 
Putnik fought with great bravery. Over the rough and 
frozen roads they crawled in retreat, suffering beyond 
words from exposure and hunger. 

An heroic stand was made at Babuna Pass which was 



168 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

reached on November 5th, and where the Serbs expected 
the AlHes, who began landing troops at Salonica on Oc- 
tober 5th, to come to their aid. The Serbs made a brave 
stand at Babuna Pass while the French made a vain effort 
to reach them. Driven from the Pass the Serbians fell 
back upon Monastir, which was not prepared. for defense. 
The Bulgarians were to get in behind the Serbian army, 
cut off its ertreat and lines of communications while the 
Germans came upon it from the north. Caught between 
the anvil and the hammer Marshal Putnik's troops would 
be destroyed and the little nation would not have a fight- 
ing man left. 

Von Mackensen came south with his armies in a leis- 
urely fashion to give the Bulgars time to carry out their 
part of the plan. When the Serbs reached Monastir the 
trap was set, because they could not hold the city, the Bul- 
gars soon taking it. Now von Mackensen came on like a 
bolt, and the poor Serbs scattered in rapid retreat to the 
west over the Montenegrin and Albanian mountains to the 
Adriatic seacoast. In their wild and disorderly flight over 
the snow-covered mountains the Serbs lost thousands of 
men from cold and hunger. It was a terrible experience 
they suffered, far worse than the Belgians before them or 
the Roumanians afterwards, among the small nations that 
were conquered by the Germans. There was only the frag- 
ment of an army left and this had to be taken overseas to 
find a safe place to rest and reorganize. 

The defeat of Serbia brought the fighting in Europe 
to an end for 1915. The year was far more successful for 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1915 169 

Germany than the year 1914 had been. She had held her 
own against France and England on the western front. 
The Russians had been driven out of Galicia and Austrian 
mihtary strength revived to cope with the fresh new enemy 
on the Italian front. Poland was in German hands, the 
vast Russian armies badly beaten and reduced, and hun- 
dreds of miles of Russian territory invaded. The Turks 
had received but one severe trial, on Gallipoli, and were 
victorious, and the open road across the Balkans by which 
they could receive the much needed guns and shells from 
Germany was a strong link in the Teutonic alliance. Al- 
together the German hopes ran high and the campaign 
of 1916 was prepared with great confidence. 

Only one more incident at the end of 1915 needs to be 
mentioned. The British army under General Townshend 
marching up the Tigris had advanced beyond Kut-el- 
Amara in Mesopotamia, where it was met and defeated by 
the Turks and driven back into the city. The Turks be- 
sieged Kut-el-Amara, which was far away from the Brit- 
ish base down the Tigris, and one more far-flung adven- 
ture of British arms was facing disaster. So as Germany 
faced the campaign of the new year with confidence, Great 
Britain faced it with concern. 



CHAPTER III 

the campaigns of 1916 
The Conflict in Asia 

British Surrender at Kut-el-Amara, and the Russian 
Advance in Armenia and Persia 

TWO interesting and more or less important events 
in Turkish Asia invite our attention at the be- 
ginning of 1916. It is necessary to keep an eye 
on these far distant fields of action at this time, in spite 
of their insignificance compared with the conflict in Eu- 
rope, and especially on the western front. In fact, all 
the fighting that was not taking place in France or Russia 
and Italy was considered as a "side-show." The opinion 
was generally held by most laymen as well as by statesmen 
and generals, that the war would be won on the western 
front. It proved to be quite true when we look at the 
results directly. But indirectly, the war could not have 
been won on the western front if these side-shows, the 
fighting in Mesopotamia, Palestine and the Balkans, had 
not weakened and destroyed the military power of Turkey 
and Bulgaria, and thus opened the way to attack Austria 
and put her out of the war. So these distant fields of 
operation had a very distinct strategic value in the Allied 

170 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1916 171 

plans, and we must watch what is going on there in con- 
nection with the immensely larger battles in Europe. 

The campaign of 1916 had two tremendous battles in 
which each side sought to win a decision. These were the 
Battle of Verdun and the Battle of the Somme. Neither 
of these battles won a decision for either side, but each 
marked a turn in the tide of the war. Two other opera- 
tions had a decided effect upon the fortunes of the belhg- 
erents, though neither was fought on the same immense 
scale as the battle in Picardy along the Somme or the bat- 
tle on the heights of the Meuse before Verdun. The 
Titans were struggling in France, but heroic conflicts took 
place in Italy and Roumania. Altogether 1916 was a 
momentous year for the nations at war. Looking back 
upon the events of this year we can see what was invisible 
at the time. The tide had turned in favor of the Allies and 
the first evidence of it was the peace proposal made by 
Germany late in the year. Germany sought to accomplish 
through negotiations what she could not achieve upon the 
field of battle. When she said, "Look at the map and see 
the extent of our victories, so why not let us come to 
terms and make peace," it was not the voice of a victor 
that was speaking, but the voice of one who, holding con- 
quests had not won; and unless peace made the conquests 
permanent, the continuance of war meant the loss of them, 
and decisive defeat. A real victor never proposes peace ; 
the vanquished does that. And Germany was conquered 
when she failed to take Verdun, and on top of this failure 
the British made their first strong blow in the war, and 



172 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

with a new weapon, the tank, they showed that the strong- 
est trench position can be broken and taken. 

But let us peek into Asia for a moment and see what 
is taking place before we look upon the heroic and im- 
mortal defense of Verdun, and follow the British through 
the agony of smashing, almost yard by yard, the strongly 
fortified German trench systems along the Somme on those 
hot days of July and August in 1916. 

The British army, consisting largely of colonials, ac- 
companied by river crafts of all descriptions up the Tigris, 
had reached Ctesiphon, an ancient city several miles be- 
yond Kut-el-Amara. Here they were defeated by the 
Turks and fell back upon Kut-el-Amara where they were 
besieged. The city was entirely surrounded by the Turks 
who were under, the command of Marshal von Der Goltz, 
a German officer. A relief expedition under command of 
General Sir Percy Lake, of about ninety thousand men, 
started early in January to rescue General Townshend's 
beleaguered troops. The advance was during the wet 
season and the troops had to march and fight over sodden 
ground. The Turks were defeated in two pitched battles. 
To avoid, however, some difficulties of a direct advance and 
attack, the British at a certain point decided to cross the 
Tigris and move up the left bank to capture the Turkish 
position at the Dujailah redoubt. To do this the troops 
had to make a night's march across the desert. This was 
a perilous task because there was no water supply, and the 
consequences in case of failure would be very grave. Gen- 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1916 173 

eral Aylmer was in command of this particular operation, 
which began on March 7th. 

After thirty hours of fighting the British had to give 
up more from exhaustion and lack of water than from the 
steadiness of the Turkish defense. The British withdrew 
to Wadi, where they were hemmed in by the floods from 
the Tigris. By April 4th the floods had receded enough to 
let General Aylmer try once more to take the Turkish 
positions and advance to the relief of General Townshend's 
troops at Kut-el-Amara. The British now stormed the 
Turkish forts on both banks of the river. Umm-el'-Hanna 
was taken; at Sanna-i-yat they were repulsed; Beit-Aiessa 
was taken and held; another attack was made on Sanna-i- 
yat but after some success the British were driven back. 
General Aylmer's troops were now worn out after eight- 
een days of continued attacks. News reached the British 
lines that there were only six days' supplies left in Kut-el- 
Amara where General Townshend's troops, suffering from 
fever and bombardment by the Turks, were awaiting 
rescue. General Aylmer had reached to within seven miles 
of the beleaguered town, but on April 28th General Town- 
shend surrendered to the Turks with 2,970 English and 
6,000 Indian troops. 

It was the first surrender of a British garrison to the 
enemy in the war. British prestige in the east fell tre- 
mendously. At home the surrender caused a wave of 
anger and disappointment. The nation had been humbled 
by the Turks, of all England's enemies who owed her the 
most in gratitude. 



174 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

So the first Mesopotamian campaign came to a dis- 
astrous end and it was many months before another ad- 
vance up the Tigris was begun. 

While the British were fighting so hard to reach Kut- 
el-Amara the Russians between the Black and Caspian 
seas wxre coming down from the Caucasus and pushing 
into Turkish Armenia. Grand Duke Nicholas after his 
defeat by the Austro-Germans on the Polish front had 
been relieved of his command and made governor of the 
Caucasus and put in command of the army there. The 
Grand Duke was a soldier of great ability, as his handling 
of the Russian armies in pulling them out of the German 
traps on the eastern front showed, and though he was sent 
to a minor field of activity he began to display his great 
qualities as a leader. 

The Russians under the command of the Grand Duke 
began an advance into Armenia early in February and by 
the sixteenth the strong fortress of Erzerum was captured. 
Soon afterwards Trebizond, another great fortress on the 
Black Sea, was in Russian hands. They reached the Lake 
Van region, driving the Turks before them. Turkish 
Armenia was rapidly being conquered and the back door 
to Constantinople was breaking on its hinges. A con- 
tingent of Russian troops advanced further southward 
through Kurdestan into Persia to join the British coming 
up the Tigris from Barsa. They reached Hamadan and 
then moved westward to Kermanshan, from which place 
some Cossacks crossed the frontier into Mesopotamia 
to the Diala river, a branch of the Tigris north- 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1916 175 

east of Bagdad. The Cossacks were not in sufficient 
force to push on, and the Russian advance came to a halt. 
Grand Duke Nicholas had captured considerable Turkish 
territory beside inflicting heavy losses upon the Turkish 
armies, and in this way his campaign was of great value 
though its direct effect upon the war was of minor im- 
portance. The result of his victories was to leave the Turk 
less strong to fight the Allies in Mesopotamia and 
Palestine later on. 

On the Western Front 

The Battle of Verdmi—'They Shall Not Bass'' 

We now turn back to the western front and to the first 
of the big battles that was fought there in 1916. In a 
war that had already reached beyond proportions in men 
engaged and guns fired that men had thought possible, was 
to come a still greater struggle. The fight for Verdun 
was epical. It was epical not merely for its momentum of 
men and steel, but for the spirit in the armies on each 
side, the spirit that was determined to conquer as well as 
the spirit that was determined to defend. Only there was 
this difference in the two spirits, the difference between 
might and right, in which the right became invincible 
through sheer faith and devotion, and crowned the de- 
fenders with heroic glory and the name of the place de- 
fended with immortality. Thus you see all the material 
strength of man in all the many devices of modern war 
armored the German spirit with confident calculation that 



176 THE STORY OF THE GKEAT WAR 

Verdun would be taken, and France pierced to her very- 
heart. The French were in no way as strong as the Ger- 
mans in the machinery of war and beside were at a great 
disadvantage in their position and the transportation sys- 
tems so necessary to bring up reenf orcements and supplies, 
but their spirit had an invisible armor that no earthly 
might could pierce. The invisible and mystical power of 
God filled the soul of the French army and they fought 
for their country not only because they loved it as their 
home but also because it was the threshold of Human 
Liberty. 

Before Verdun Germany assembled a mighty host of 
men and guns. What she had done in the way of prepara- 
tion before Warsaw and on the Dunajec was surpassed 
many times. There were concentrated 1,500 large guns 
on a narrow front of seven miles. It was arranged so that 
these heavy guns could be moved up into position as 
raj)idly as the infantry advanced. In fact the Germans 
intended that the artillery should do the major part of 
the work, the infantry merely clearing up the destroyed 
trenches and wreckage so the guns could take their ad- 
vanced positions. The distance from the German lines to 
Verdun was slightly over eight miles, and in following this 
method the Germans believed they could reach Verdun in 
four days. It was the army of the German Crown Prince, 
composed of the best soldiers of the empire, under the 
real and direct command of General Count von Haeseler, 
whose task it was to assault and take Verdun. 

Verdun lies in a valley sitting on the west bank of 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1916 177 

the river Meuse. To the north is a ridge running east 
and west, on which were a number of old forts; beyond 
these are several hills, among them Hill 304 and Le Mort 
Homme (Dead Man's Hill), which were held by the 
French and the scene of heavy fighting. But on the east 
side of the river was a long plateau about six hundred 
feet high and eight or nine miles long running slightly 
northwest and southeast. Along this plateau were several 
hills. This plateau and range of hills are called the 
Heights of the Meuse and separates the Plain of the 
Woevre on the east from the river Meuse on the west. 
On the hills that ran along the crest of the plateau were 
the forts around which the terrific struggle centered during 
the first five days of the battle. The town of Verdun itself 
was of little military importance. It was soon reduced to 
ruins by the German guns. Both of the railroads that 
ran into the city were under fire of the German artillery 
so that troops, guns and supplies had to be sent by motor 
transports over a single road to the front. 'No wonder 
there was confidence in the words of the German Crown 
Prince to his soldiers before the battle began, in which he 
said, "I, Wilham, see the German Fatherland compelled 
to pass to the attack." They really meant, "I, William, 
shall see you take Verdun." 

A little after seven o'clock on the morning of February 
21, 1916, the Germans opened the battle with a furious 
attack. The first hne of trenches held by French Terri- 
torials across the Heights of the Meuse, for a distance of 
seven miles, were pounded out of existence. The next 



178 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

day the Germans came on with an even fiercer deluge of 
shells, and soon the second line of trenches were blasted 
away. The fighting now was in the o})en, and in the midst 
of a severe snowstorm. The cold was intense, the wounded 
freezing to death where they fell. At the end of four 
days the Germans had advanced four miles and were in 
possession of Fort Douaumont from which they looked 
down upon Verdun four miles away. The capture of 
Fort de Vaux, a few hundred yards to the east, and Fort 
de Souville, a mile in front of them to the south, and the 
road to the Verdun would be open. Without reenforce- 
ments the French Territorials that fought on the Heights 
of the Meuse were exhausted. A crisis had been reached 
not only for the brave defenders who under the most ter- 
rible punishment of the German artillery had only yielded 
ground by inches, but for all France. France had now to 
decide whether to defend Verdun or let the Germans 
take it. 

General Castelnau who had been sent to command at 
Verdun when the battle broke, decided to defend the city. 
But General Petain came with the troops that were to be 
thrown into the breach. Day and night over the highways 
and into the road that led to Verdun the motor transports, 
Working like clockwork, rolled towards the city with troops 
and guns and munitions and supplies. They came not a 
day too late. 

On February 26th a French counter-attack on the 
Douaumont Plateau brought the head of the German ad- 
vance to a halt. General Petain had thrown an army 




THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1916 179 

across the Meuse, and while the counter-attack was taking 
place, and holding with a grim purpose, his troops were 
digging defensive positions, and bringing up and placing 
artillery. The barrier had been thrown across the Ger- 
man front which brought the first stage of the Battle of 
Verdun to an end. What followed was the siege of Ver- 
dun, which lasted until the end of August. If the resist- 
ance of the French Territorials in the five days' battle had 
been heroic, the immovable defense of the French army 
during the long siege was glorious. 

It was during this siege that the French poilu echoed 
in his heart the remark of the masterly leader, General 
Petain, that "They shall not pass!" It was not only the 
fervent battlecry of those thousands upon thousands of 
Frenchmen who so willingly laid down their lives before 
Verdun, but it was the agonized watchword of all France 
and the Allied world. Those words, each one a fiery 
symbol of hope and salvation, rose out of the despair of 
those awful first five days of the battle; rose from doubt 
and defeat, until the succor of Petain's reenforcements and 
Petain's genius brought the wheels of the ^German jugger- 
naut to a halt. From this the words became lit with en- 
thusiasm. "They shall not pass" rose from the altar of 
sacrifice, and the music of them, both in speech and mean- 
ing, became a holy anthem to the ears of the dying and a 
beatitude to the ears of the tired and broken but uncon- 
quered spirit of the living. 

Stopped on the Douaumont Plateau the Germans 
shifted their attacks to the left bank of the Meuse to Dead 



180 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

Man's Hill and Hill 304. Here during :March, April and 
May the Germans poured their men in with reckless in- 
difference to losses. The object they sought was gained, 
that is to jirevent the French from attacking the Germans 
on their flank on the Douaumont Plateau. The French 
gave up these blood-stained hills when they became no 
longer worth the price in men to hold. But they did not 
do so before the Germans were made to pay in losses far 
more than the hills were worth. 

At the same time the Germans were making such a 
mighty effort to capture Dead Man's Hill and Hill 304, 
they were making a mightier effort to capture Fort de 
Vaux on the right bank of the river on the Heights of 
the Meuse. This was the most titanic of all the Verdun 
fighting because the fall of this fort opened the way for 
an advance upon the Thiaumont redoubt and Fort de 
Souville, the last important defenses before Verdun. It 
took the Germans three months to surround Fort de Vaux. 
Before this had happened Major Raynal and his little 
garrison of 600 men had for weeks withstood all attacks, 
keeping in communication with his superiors by carrier 
pigeons and heliograph. The garrison fought on until 
food and water were gone. The Germans had used every 
one of their crudest devices to shake the stubborn spirit 
of the defenders. The inside of the fort was bombed^ 
poison gas and liquid fire poured down the galleries, and 
yet the brave defenders held on. But when food and water 
had been used up the end came, and the heroic garrison 
surrendered. 



1 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1916 181 

It was now the beginning of June and the Germans 
made one vast last effort in the center, pointing southwest 
from Fort Douaumont, to advance and take Fort de Sou- 
ville which alone stood in the way of complete victory. If 
Fort de Souville fell the French would have to fall back 
upon Forts St. Michel and Belleville about a mile north of 
Verdun, and which were untenable owing to the cross-fire 
from the German batteries on Dead Plan's Hill and Hill 
304 to the northwest, and from the Heights of the Meuse 
to the east. 

After two months of severe fighting the Germans had 
only advanced from the Douaumont Plateau on the right 
to Fort de Vaux on the left, a little more than a mile. 
They were stopped before Fort de Souville, less than 
three miles from Verdun, after six months of the most 
grueling effort. They did not pass, and before they could 
try again the roar of guns in Picardy told them their last 
chance had come and gone. If the Germans had one con- 
solation, it was in the belief that the long agony at Verdun 
had bled France white. It was a poor consolation for the 
shame and defeat that was Germany's, but it was a con- 
solation wholly imaginary. Of the more than half a 
million men who went down to death in the long struggle 
for Verdun, by far the larger number wore the uniform 
of the imperial master whom they uselessly served in try- 
ing to add a vain luster to his military pride. 

And France, — France alone stood with her body in the 
breach, torn and bleeding, but immovable. If the haughty 
Brandenburgers that took the empty and abandoned husk 



182 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

of Fort Douaumont stand as a symbol of the German ef- 
fort at Verdun, Petain's Iron Corps, the lads of Brittany 
and Lorraine, who held the gray avalanche in its tracks 
for two days until reenforcements came to bar the way, 
stand for the symbol of the French victory. It was glori- 
ous and immortal ! 

The Battle of the Somme 

While the Germans were at the height of their final 
effort to advance upon and take Fort de Souville, west- 
ward in Picardy the guns of the British broke in a mighty 
roar beginning the Battle of the Somme. This battle is 
notable for its test of the new British army, with which for 
the first time Great Britain threw her full strength into 
the war. 

The battle opened on the morning of July first on a 
front of twenty miles from Gommecourt, south of Arras, 
to Maricourt, east of Albert. On the British right were 
the French under the command of General Foch. The 
onslaught of the first day was a terrific punishment for the 
British in spite of the advance that was made on the south- 
ern end of the line towards the east. Towards the north the 
British were held up all along the line. The Germans 
had been turned out of seven miles of their front line, 3,500 
prisoners captured with a quantity of material and ma- 
chine-guns. But the British had lost 50,000 men. They 
paid this price for a mile of territory. 

The French action in the whole Somme battle was 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1916 183 

mainly in support of the British. But the seasoned vet- 
erans under General Foch's command swept forward five 
miles on this first day, capturing many villages and 6,000 
prisoners. They struck east towards Peronne, and north 
towards Combles. After the first day of fighting General 
Haig, the English commander, was confronted with a 
perplexing problem. Severe as the opening bombardment 
had been, the German positions were not destroyed. The 
attacking waves of British infantry were met and sepa- 
rated by the artillery barrages of the Germans thrown 
from the heights they held, which commanded the whole 
area of fighting. JNIachine-gunners came out of the dug- 
outs with their deadly instruments and mowed the British 
down like grain. 

General Haig's problem was whether, after the failure 
to smash through, on a wide front, he should fight an 
infinite series of local engagements and so eat his way 
into the German systems of forts, trenches and redoubts, 
and force a retirement. On the 2nd of July the British 
commander declined to burrow a hole through the two 
wings of the German front, get at the enemy's rear and 
thus loosen his grip on the territory between the two wings. 
The Battle of the Somme became what is known as a battle 
of attrition, that is to wear and tear down the enemy's 
man power by forcing him to throw in reserves that could 
not be replaced. 

For nearly two weeks after the battle began the Brit- 
ish were engaged in clearing up the territory between the 
captured first-line German trenches and the second line 



184 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

that was to be attacked. Now began that long series of 
agonizing efforts to the northeast which came to a chmax 
in the capture of Contalmaison and the breaking of the sec- 
ond hne of German trenches. The latter place was held 
by the crack Prussian Guards, the pride of the Kaiser's 
army, whom the raw lads of a Yorkshire and Dorsetshire 
regiment finally drove with severe losses out of the place. 
The British kept on to Barentin, where they opened a gap 
three miles wide in the German line. But this gap was 
of little significance unless it could be widened for further 
advances. The fighting up to the capture of Barentin had 
raged doggedly around Bailiff Wood, Mametz Wood, 
Bernafay Wood, and Trones Wood, the strongly held 
positions that had to be taken before the British could 
attack the second line of German trenches which rested 
on the top of a ridge above Pozieres, eastward to Lon- 
gueval before Delville Wood. 

On this tangled and complicated battlefield it is better 
from now on to the end of the battle to follow the two 
British armies that carried the advance on the right and 
left of the gap at Barentin. General Sir Hubert Gough 
was in command of the Fifth Army on the left and Gen- 
eral Sir Henry Rawlinson in command of the Fourth 
Army on the right. It was the latter army that did the 
heaviest fighting. 

On July 23rd the Fifth Army turned westward in an 
attack upon Pozieres on the way to Thiepval, the third 
German line of defense. Rawlinson's Fourth Army 
turned east upon the third line running north and south 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1916 185 

from Ginchy to Guillemont. The fighting in both direc- 
tions was very severe and prolonged, each step of the way 
caHing for innumerable local engagements, in which the 
losses on both sides were heav>\ By September 15th the 
British had reached Thiepval on the left and taken Ginchy 
and Guillemont on the right, bringing the front up before 
Martinspuich in the center to the north of Barentin. In 
the meantime the French had helped the British to extend 
the front towards the east, pushing close to Combles and 
Peronne along the Bapaume-Peronne highway. 

On September 15th a new stage in the Battle of the 
Somme began with an advance all along the line from 
Pozieres Ridge to Bouleaux Wood, a distance of ten miles, 
the widest front on which the British had attacked since 
the opening day of the battle, July first. 

All along the line the objectives were taken. Thiepval, 
Courcelette, Flers, Morval, Combles, Fregicourt, and 
Bouchavesnes fell. Five thousand prisoners and a dozen 
guns were captured. After weeks of fighting, carefully 
and skillfully prepared German strongholds had been 
taken almost foot by foot, and at last the enemy's defense 
was weakened. He had no more entrenchments in the 
rear that could withstand the terrific onslaughts of Gen- 
eral Haig's troops. 

On the first day of the advance a new weapon of at- 
tack was thrown against the Germans at Courcelette. The 
Germans were amazed and terrified to see rolling down 
upon them huge, lumbering machines from which belched 
fire and death. These awkward but formidable engines of 



186 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

destruction were the tanks. Taking the idea from the 
farm-tractor, the English had invented a land-fort that 
moved over the ground like a caterpillar, tumbling in and 
out of trenches, and riding down the obstacles that stood 
in its way. They moved very slowly, so that the infantry 
had to reduce its speed not to outrun them. But they were 
irresistible against machine-gun and rifle attack, nosing 
their way into machine-gun nests to the consternation of 
the enemy, who turned and fled or were killed where they 
stood. The British troops who accompanied these awk- 
ward, creeping monsters, were gi-eatly amused at the 
antics they displayed, and went into battle shaken with 
laughter at the sight they made. The appearance of the 
tanks was a great mystery to the enemy because the secret 
of them had been closely guarded. It took a great deal of 
adventurous daring on the part of the crews that manned 
them. Though they did effective work, many broke down 
from defective mechanism, though none were captured by 
the Germans. An experiment in the fight for Courcelette, 
they proved of such decided value that the type was de- 
veloped and enlarged and the weapon became one of the 
most dependable in future attacks upon defenses deeply 
and thickly protected with barbed-wire entanglements. In 
a way the tank was the inventive answer of the English to 
the Germans' poison gas. And the English invention was 
at the same time the more destructive and the more hu- 
mane. It not only killed and killed sharply, which war as 
a killing permits, but it destroyed defenses, of earth, steel, 






Paintinfi by Clinton Pettee 

Courtesy of the " Scientific American " 



© Munn & Co.. Inc. 



THE TERRIBLE ENGINE MOVED CLUMSILY UPON THE GERMAN LINES 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1916 187 

and concrete, which the cunning devices of the enemy had 
created. 

In October, after three months of severe fighting, Gen- 
eral Haig saw before him the prospects of a further ad- 
vance that would yield big results. The Germans had been 
pushed off the high ground they held, they had been driven 
out of their last systems of fortified positions. Between 
the Oise and the Scarpe rivers they had been forced back, 
leaving two dangerous salients on their right and left 
wings. Though further gains were yet to be made by 
the British before the battle died down, the hopes of in- 
flicting a disastrous defeat upon the enemy was dashed by 
the bad weather which set in early in the autumn of 1916. 
Heavy and continuous rains turned the ground into a 
perfect quagmire. It was impossible in many places for 
the infantry to advance owing to the mud, and the shell- 
holes filled with water that covered the broken ground. 

One more offensive movement, however, took place at 
the northern end of the line on the west bank of the river 
Ancre, to Beaumont-Hamel. This advance, which was 
made on November 13th, after a brilliant attack, was also 
brought to a stop by the increasing bad weather of the 
autumn. But the British had flattened out a considerable 
salient and brought their line up on an even front from 
Beaumont-Hamel to Le Sars and on by Le Transloy, 
where it bent southward to join the French before Peronne 
and St. Quentin. 

So the first Battle of the Somme came to end in No- 
vember after five months of terrific fighting. It had worn 



188 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

down the German armies that had opposed the advance. 
And it ended with a threat that the German General Staff 
did not dare to ignore, as we shall see later when the cam- 
paign for 1917 begins. But the five months of fighting 
had exacted an enormous toll on both sides. The furthest 
advance of the British and French during the five months 
of fighting had been for a distance of little more than seven 
miles. Something like two hundred square miles of terri- 
tory had been recaptured, and about 80,000 prisoners. The 
Germans suffered a total loss of a half -million men, but 
the Anglo-French loss was nearly three-quarters of a 
million men. One indisputable fact the Battle of the 
Somme proved, was, that after two years of preparation, 
the British, in spite of Germany's doubt when the conflict 
started, were in the war with mighty armies that meant to 
fight to the end. 

On the Italian Front 

About the time that the French, after three months of 
desperate fighting, had decided to yield Dead ISIan's Hill 
and Hill 304 to the Germans to the north of Verdun, and 
while the British were preparing, but had not yet struck 
their first blow on the Somme, the Austrians delivered a 
sudden and dangerous stroke at Italy. It will be recalled 
that the situation on the Italian front was fraught with 
considerable danger. Italy had thrown troops north into 
the Trentino to cover Austrian attacks down the moun- 
tainous passes that led on to the Venetian and Lombard 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1916 189 

plains. The real strength of the Italian armies was not 
here, but far to the eastward where they had crossed the 
Isonzo River below Gorizia to the sea, and above on the 
western bank of the stream stood ready to push further 
into Austrian territory. Should the Austrians break 
through the Trentino they would be in the rear of the 
Isonzo armies and it would be impossible for them to 
escape disaster. 

This is what the Austrians under Archduke Charles, 
who a little later was to succeed Francis Joseph as em- 
peror of Austria, attempted to do. With nearly 500,000 
troops and 2,000 guns under his command. Archduke 
Charles came blasting down the Trentino about the middle 
of May. Between the Val Lagarina and the Val Zugana 
the Austrians came down through Arsiero and Asiago, 
over the Communi Plateau to within a few miles of Schio 
on the edge of the Venetian Plain. They reached this 
position about the first of June. Count Cadorna, the 
Italian commander-in-chief, brought up a fresh army at 
this point and checked the advance. He immediately be- 
gan a counter-attack along the entire front. The Aus- 
trians were first held, and then driven back, so that within 
the next ten days the Archduke Charles had lost all that 
had been gained by the offensive. 

The speedy recovery by the Italians of the ground that 
was lost, while in a measure due to the intrepid fighting of 
Cadorna's fresh troops, was also helped by the menace of 
Brusiloff's drive in Volhynia and Galicia which drew some 
of Austria's best battalions from the Trentino. The Aus- 



190 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

trian attempt at this time had no effect upon the Isonzo 
advance, and only proved a costly adventure in men and 
material that they could ill afford to waste. 

The Austrian advance had one decided effect upon the 
Italians. This was to make them more strongly guard 
this approach of the enemy into the heart of northern 
Italy. So defenses were prepared and rail communica- 
tions constructed to enable the defenders to stiffen their 
resistance at any point heavily attacked. When these were 
completed, towards the first of August, the Italians 
turned to the offensive on the Isonzo. 

The central point of attack was the Gorizia bridge- 
head, which had defied the Italian advance for nearly a 
year. On August 6th, the attack began. To the north and 
south of Gorizia the Italians advanced, taking most diffi- 
cult positions. Two days later Cadorna's troops on three 
sides closed in and captured the town with 20,000 prison- 
ers, and immense stores of supplies. It was a brilhant 
achievement which thrilled Italy from end to end. But it 
was only the beginning of the Italian advance, a beginning 
that was to proceed no further for some months to come. 
With a grip on the Bainzizza Plateau to the north, where 
there was to be bitter fighting over a prolonged period be- 
fore progress was made ; with a firm footing on the Garso 
Plateau to the south, and less than sixteen miles from 
Trieste, the goal of Italian aspiration, and where even 
bitterer fighting was to take place that brought no reward, 
the Italian armies stood helpless after a great success. 

The stopping and beating back of the Austrian wave 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1916 191 

that flowed down the Trentino, together with the enor- 
mous strain that the advance and capture of Gorizia im- 
posed, had brought the Itahans to the point of exhaustion. 
But more than spent energy was spent ammunition, to 
the Itahans. They had used lavishly of their store in the 
two great battles, and the nation could not replenish the 
store from its own resources of labor and material. Italy 
was as dependent as Russia on France and England for 
munitions. So Italy had to wait, wait for the eventful 
year 1917, which saw her make a noble effort, meet a great 
disaster, and arise from it in shining glory. 

On the Eastern Front 

Russia s Last Campaign 

Turning to the eastern front at a time when the French 
were fighting desperately before Verdun, the British were 
staging the great drive that was tortuously to drag across 
Picardy, and when the Italians were girding themselves to 
stop the Austrians at the edge of the Venetian Plain, we 
see the last flash in the pan of war by the Russian armies. 
The Russian troops were fighting for the last time under, 
and for, an imperial master. JNIilitary Russia was doomed 
to expire with the dynasty that it supported, and for whose 
glory and advantage it had for centuries past gone meekly 
forth to the wars that the czars had declared. It is a 
strange destiny to contemplate, that of a nation actually 
fighting for generations in behalf of masters who took the 
people's victories to tighten upon them the chains of 



192 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

slavery, and the slaves refusing to fight for their liberty 
when the opportunity came. But this was the tragedy of 
Russia, one of the most extraordinary experiences that 
ever befell a nation in the world's history. 

General Brusiloff, a fiery and energetic soldier, was 
in command of the Russian armies. Four of them op- 
posed five Austrian armies from Pinsk on the Pripet 
Marshes to the Roumanian border. Altogether there were 
over 2,000,000 men engaged when the battle commenced, 
but the Austrians increased their numbers from the Italian 
front as the conflict developed. The front of attack was 
three hundred miles long. 

A tremendous battle was begun when the Russian guns 
commenced a bombardment all along the three hundred 
mile front on June 4th. In the first few days the Russians 
under General Kaledin swept forward fifty miles, over- 
whelming the army of the Austrian Archduke Joseph 
Ferdinand, and captured the great Volhynian fortresses 
of Dubno and Lutsk. The river Styr was passed and 
the fleeing Austrians pursued towards Kovel. Their loss 
in prisoners alone amounted to 70,000 men. 

Further south the Austrians had been cleared out of 
Bukowina and were in retreat towards the Carpathian 
Mountains. On this front General Pflanzer had lost dur- 
ing the first week of the advance over 40,000 prisoners. 
Only in the center did the Austrians hold their ground, 
but this was growing more dangerous each day, as on 
both of the Austrian wings they had been badly beaten 
and driven back for miles. From the north and from the 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1916 193 

south the Russians seemed in a fair way to advance upon 
Lemberg, the GaHcian capital. The Austrians seemed 
quite helpless to cope with the situation and Germany 
came to her help to save the important railroad center at 
Kovel. At this place the Russian advance was checked. 
It was now the end of June and the first stage of the of- 
fensive was over. The Russians had captured 200,000 
prisoners and hundreds of cannon, but their own losses 
had been enormous. 

Before beginning another general advance along the 
entire line General Brusiloff straightens his northern 
wing. This he does during the first two weeks in July, 
and the line runs from the Pripet Marshes to Brody which 
had been taken. The Austrian center under General 
Bothmer still stands its ground, and is too strong in its 
position to be turned out on the left or northern flank. 
General Brusiloff then orders the Russians under General 
Lechitsky, who broke the Austrians in Bukowina, to take 
Stanislau and advance upon Halicz, thus turning General 
Bothmer out of his position from the south. The Rus- 
sians reach Stanislau on August 10th and General Both- 
mer safely retires behind the Zlota Lipa river before Brze- 
rany. Here, on August 15th, the Russians under General 
Scherbachoff attack the Austrians in a battle that lasted 
three weeks, at the end of which they were forced back 
upon Halicz to the south. Roumania's entry in the war 
had drawn Lechitskj^'s army south to the Carpathians to 
protect the flank of the Roumanian army invading 
Transylvania. 



194 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

By September Brusiloff's campaign had come to an 
end. It had been fought on a large scale, thousands of 
miles of territory had been captured, and hundreds of 
thousands of prisoners taken. The impetuosity and dash 
of the commander-in-chief had awakened the admiration 
and hope of the Allies that Russia had completely re- 
covered from her defeats of the previous year. When the 
offensive ended Lemberg was but twenty-five miles from 
the Russian front, and there seemed every prospect that 
on the next advance it would be captured by the Czar's 
troops for a second time. It was a victorious group of 
armies that stood from the Pripet Marshes to the Rouma- 
nian border, before Kovel, Lemberg and Halicz in Sep- 
tember, after a three months' campaign. But in the 
shadow of them was defeat, that reached stealthily and in- 
visibly from an idol called license, which the people of the 
white capital in the north had set up to reign on the throne 
of the Little Father who was cast out upon the ruins of 
time. 

The Conquest of Boumania 

The success of Brusiloff's advance through Volhynia 
and Bukowina which I have just described, convinced 
Roumania that the time was ripe to attack Austria and 
invade Transylvania, an Austrian province largely in- 
habited by Roumanians. Accordingly on August 27th 
Roumania declared war and immediately threw troops 
across the frontier. General Lechitsky with the Ninth 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1916 195 

Russian Army, as was noted in the last chapter, came down 
from the Dneister about Stanislau to the Carpathians to 
protect the right flank of the Roumanians, and move across 
into Hungary on their success. Three of the four 
Roumanian armies poured through the passes of the 
Transylvanian Alps, while the fourth was to stand along 
the Danube and guard the Dobrudja to the Black Sea. 
The Roumanians pushed forward rapidly and soon a 
large portion of Transylvania was in their hands. Kron- 
stadt was captured and General Averscu's forces stood at 
the gates of Hermannstadt, two important cities. 

Flushed with this early success the Roumanians were 
destined to taste a bitter disappointment and defeat. The 
first disappointment came with Russia's betrayal of her 
weaker ally. A new Russian premier, Boris Stiirmer, 
was intensely pro-German and refused utterly to send the 
Roumanians help of any kind. A second disappointment 
was the action of Bulgaria. Russia had convinced the 
Roumanians that Bulgaria would remain neutral, but as 
soon as the Roumanians had crossed into Transylvania 
Bulgaria declared war. In less than two weeks from the 
beginning of the campaign General von Mackensen with 
an army of Bulgarians, Turks and Germans was attack- 
ing in the Dobrudja. This was a serious turn of affairs 
for the Roumanians. Withdrawing some troops from the 
north they were sent south to reenforce the Dobrudja 
army and check von Mackensen's advance upon the Buch- 
arest- Constanza railroad. 

The Roumanians had met with little opposition to their 



196 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

advance into Transylvania. But things were now to take 
a different turn. A mighty German army was gathering 
under General von Falkenhayn to act in harmony with 
von INIackensen in the south for the purpose of crushing 
Roumania. On September 20th Falkenhayn's drive 
began. 

His plan was to defeat singly the three Roumanian 
armies in Transylvania, drive through the Passes and 
descend upon Bucharest to link up with von Mackensen 
coming from the Danube in the south. The Roumanians 
were decisively beaten and Falkenhayn's forces moved 
through the Passes down on the Wallachian Plain. Late 
in October von Mackensen had moved upon and captured 
Constanza, the only Roumanian seaport on the Black Sea. 
Early in December the forces of Falkenhayn and von 
Mackensen met before Bucharest. On the fourth was 
fought the Battle of Argelu, the last effort of the Rouma- 
nians to save their capital. Defeated, Bucharest was evac- 
uated the next day, and on the sixth the Germans took 
possession. The Government fled to Jassy near the Rus- 
sian border. Two-thirds of Roumania was in the hands of 
the Germans. Most of the great oil wells and the wheat 
crops which the Germans so much needed and expected to 
capture, were destroyed by the Roumanian army in retreat. 
In the hundred days' campaign General Avercu's forces 
which had started with 300,000 men in the field and 300,- 
000 levies in reserve, had lost half their total number in 
killed, wounded and prisoners. Roumania had now gone 
the way of Belgium and Serbia, but her plight in a sense 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1916 197 

was worse. Entirely isolated from the friends that could 
help her, she was at the mercy of Germany. Russia she 
could no longer trust, and if she could, the Russians were 
soon to become as helpless as herself, and of no assistance. 
To this helplessness, following the Russian collapse, was 
to be added humiliation when von Mackensen later im- 
posed upon the nation a shameful and tyrannic peace. 

The Army of the Orient 

We close the year 1916 with a glance at Salonica in 
Macedonia where a large Allied force under General Sar- 
rail was gathered. Troops were first landed here to go to 
the help of Serbia in the previous year when the Germans 
and Bulgarians had attacked and invaded King Peter's 
country. This help came too late, and the British and 
French, after their failure to reach the Serbians, retired 
upon Salonica. Finally the Serbs after their defeat, and 
reorganization on the Island of Corfu, were brought to 
the city and joined the forces of France, England and 
Italy. There were also small numbers of troops from 
other countries, so that the Army of the Orient, as it was 
known, was a queer and picturesque mixture of many na- 
tions. 

Despite its readiness and complete fitness to fight. 
General Sarrail did not dare to advance from his base in 
the city. He feared an attack from the Greek king, 
Constantine, who was playing into Germany's hands, if 
an advance was made against the Bulgarians, who were 



198 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

allowed to take two forts, Kavala and Drama in Mace- 
donia. When the Bulgarians made an advance from the 
west and threatened Salonica itself, the Greek people 
would no longer tolerate the actions of the King and their 
sentiment so changed, that General Sarrail felt safe to 
open an attack against the troops of Czar Ferdinand. 

About the middle of September, after its long in- 
activity, a small force of Serbians, Russians and French, 
drove the Bulgarians beyond Ostrovo Lake towards 
Monastir. Monastir lies in the bend of the Cenea river 
along whose course was the only feasible line of advance 
northward in this mountainous country to the Bulgarian 
border. Before the city on the east is a plain and on the 
north a range of hills. The Allies came along the eastern 
heights which conmiand the plain and drove the Bulgarians 
out of Monastir which the Serbians entered on November 
19th. The Bulgarians, however, held the hills to the north, 
from which they could not be shaken. So the campaign 
came to an end with the Serbians once more on their own 
soil. The situation, however, was to remain as we now 
leave it, for two years, or until the final blow which on all 
the fronts was to bring the w^ar to a victorious end for 
the AlHes. During this time the Balkan area was to fade 
from the attention of the world. 



CHAPTER IV 

THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1917 

THE year 1917 opened hopefully for the Allies on 
the western front. It was still the opinion of 
many in high places that the war would be won 
on this front and that whatever happened elsewhere would 
finally be determined by the results in France and Flan- 
ders. Whether this was an attempt to minimize the seri- 
ousness of the German victories in the East, I do not know. 
Those victories were very solid when the new year opened, 
and there was no way in sight by which they could be 
shaken. Solid as was Germany's military position in the 
East as a superstructure, it was not necessary to have very 
discerning eyes to see that the props on which it stood were 
not strong. Austria, Bulgaria and Turkey had con- 
stantly to call upon Germany for help in one way or an- 
other, to pull them out of difficult places. They were 
never secure from a military point of view without the 
support of German troops and generals. Neither could 
the inhabitants of these countries stand the burdens of war 
as they were stood in the German empire. When the time 
came that made it imperative for the Kaiser to throw all 
of his mihtary strength on the western front his aUies 
would be sure to crumble. As long as Germany herself 
was safe and it was a case of saving Austria, Bulgaria or 

199 



200 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

Turkey, she could always manage to save them. But once 
Germany was in peril, and had to think of nothing but 
her own self-defense, her three allies could neither save 
themselves nor her. 

Ever since the Battle of the Somme the initiative on 
the western front was in the hands of the Allies. This 
meant that France or England could choose the time and 
place of battle which would naturally be to their ad- 
vantage. Thus the Germans saw the Allies slowly but 
surely forcing them back to the frontier and with each 
mile making the situation more difficult. The end of 1916 
found the Germans looking defeat in the face unless some- 
thing was done. Fortunately for them the early coming 
of winter stopped the fighting before General Haig could 
reap the rewards of his long battle, which was but a prepa- 
ration for the final blow. Bad weather had more than 
once during the war favored the enemy as if it had a spe- 
cial interest in his welfare. But never before had it 
brought the Germans such an opportunity as they made 
use of during the winter of 1916-17. 

Two events happened early in 1917 which call for 
comment before we follow the course of the armies. They 
had such a bearing upon the military developments of the 
war from now on that their significance cannot be de- 
tached from the immediate events under review. 

The first of these events was the Russian revolution 
and the absolute collapse of the Russian empire as a factor 
in the war. The Czar was overthrown in March. With 
the internal conditions in Russia we are not concerned 




Painting by L. -i- -^ A 
Reprinted by I't-niii.w' 



inc Cart's 



"THE SPIRIT OF 1917" 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1917 201 

here, only their effect upon the mihtary situation of the 
AUies. The new government in Russia made a declaration 
that they would stand by the Allies, and a fitful attempt 
was made to carry on an offensive in Volhynia. A slight 
advance was made which resulted in the capture of Halicz 
and a number of prisoners. But the Russian armies had 
been infected with socialistic doctrines and threw down 
their arms. Positions that were won at a great sacrifice of 
blood were given up without a struggle, the soldiers 
abandoning the trenches and deserting to the rear. These 
poor peasants were slaughtered by thousands by the Ger- 
man artillery as they fled in mad haste from the front. 
Russia was now definitely out of the war. 

The result of the Russian collapse was to release all 
the German armies on the eastern front to be thrown 
against France and England in the west. 

The only hopeful sign that the Allies could see piercing 
through the Russian cloud was the entry of the United 
States in the war. This took place in April. But America 
was not prepared, was thousands of miles from the con- 
flict, and this hopeful sign was dimmed with the doubt of 
the Republic being ready in time to balance and then turn 
the scales against the Germans. France and England 
waited tremblingly to see who would win the race, 
whether the Germans could turn and throw their whole 
weight and win a decision before America was in Europe 
with a mighty army, or whether America could place her 
troops in the field before Germany was ready to strike a 
final blow. 



202 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

The German Retreat 

The fighting in 1917 does not take on the momentous 
character of the fighting in 1916. Before the British 
and French were ready to start the big offensive that was 
planned, they were surprised to find one morning in March 
that the Germans had sHpped away over a wide front from 
Arras in the north to Soissons in the south. Between the 
two points was a distance of over seventy miles. Many 
thousand square miles of French territory were given up 
and France was thrilled at this voluntary return of her 
own soil. But a wave of anger followed the wave of joy, 
not only in France but throughout the civilized world, 
when it was learned that it was nothing but a barren, 
desolate waste of towns and farms, of choked and gutted 
roads, of ruined orchards and woodlands that the Germans 
left behind. This devastation was not the result of battle, 
as so many places in France and Flanders where the 
armies in deadly grip had fought, but deliberate, wanton, 
cruel destruction by a sullen foe. The Germans did this 
dastardly work not only to make the present suffer but 
the future as well. Young fruit trees were destroyed that 
they may not delight and nourish the generations of the 
future, wells were poisoned that the thirst may not be 
quenched. Nothing could be seen but savage destruction 
of everything made by God and man ; the humble peasant's 
cottage with its rough furniture as well as the castle with 
its costly and elaborate furniture. 

The Germans called this their "strategic retreat." A 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1917 203 

wholly voluntary affair, for which they had a definite pur- 
pose in mind. No one believed this, but took it as a savage 
acknowledgment of defeat. It was, in a sense, due to de- 
feat, but it was, as the Germans hinted, the first step to- 
wards a gigantic preparation for the mighty blow they in- 
tended to strike in the following year. Ever since the 
campaign of 1916 was over the Germans had begun pre- 
paring a system of defenses in the rear which extended for 
many miles. It was called the "Hindenburg Line," after 
the general who was the idol of the German public. The 
Kaiser had made him his Chief of Staff, and it was von 
Hindenburg's brain that conceived and carried out the re- 
treat, and built that wonderful bastion of defenses known 
by his name, and which was thought to be impregnable 
against all attacks. 

All through the summer and the next winter the Ger- 
mans worked on these defenses, and brought their troops 
from the east to train and prepare for the final blow. 

The German General Staff believed that the Allies 
would not be able to attack for some time owing to the 
condition of the country over which the retreat passed. 
It was impossible, they thought, to move guns across the 
ravished country. Thus the whole Allied plan for the 
spring campaign would be upset. In this, however, they 
were deceived. On the ninth of April General Haig opened 
the Battle of Arras and on April 16th General Nivelle, 
who had succeeded Joffre as Commander-in-Chief of the 
French armies, began an offensive to take the Heights of 
the Aisne just west of Soissons. This was a concerted 



204 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

action on the part of the French and British armies to 
outflank the Germans on both wings and force their re- 
tirement. 

One of the most debated incidents of the war arose 
from this effort. In two or three days General Nivelle in 
spite of his tremendous losses, had the prospects of a great 
victory in his hands, when suddenly the offensive came to 
a dead halt. It is said that France, appalled at the 
casualties, through the mouth of her politicians demanded 
that the slaughter be stopped. It was stopped. General 
Nivelle relieved of his command and exiled to a post in 
Morocco. General Petain, the defender of Verdun, suc- 
ceeded to the supreme command of the French armies. 
Later, through the summer, action was renewed before the 
Heights of the Aisne, and in October troops under Gen- 
eral Maistre advanced upon the much coveted Chemin des 
Dames (Ladies' Road) all along the ridge which had been 
in the possession of the Germans ever since 1914. By 
November the French had reached the Oise- Aisne canal 
beyond the heights, with their left flank on the Forest of 
Coucy. It was an important advance. 

The spectacular fighting of the spring, summer and 
autumn of this year, however, was on the British end of 
the line in the north. Here the attempt was made to 
pierce the front where the old and new German lines met 
just westward of Lens. Lens was in the coal district of 
northern France and had been held by the Germans since 
early in the war. It was a great loss to the French, who 
were deprived of a large percentage of their coal supply. 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1917 205 

The Battle of Arras is notable for two daring and 
successful exploits. The first was the taking of Vimy 
Ridge by the Canadians on April Qth, when the battle 
opened, and the second was the capture of Messines Ridge. 
The object in taking these places was to command a con- 
tinuation of the high ground to the north which ran from 
the ridges that had been won in the Battle of the Somme 
the previous year. This gave the British a great advantage 
over the Germans, who were on low ground and exposed 
to the British guns. A further advance to the north in 
front of Ypres towards the Menin-Roulers highway would 
drive the Germans out of Zeebrugge and Ostend and de- 
prive them of these important submarine bases on the 
I'landers coast. The Third Battle of Ypres was fought 
from the end of July to the beginning of November. 

But the two exploits which I have mentioned demand 
some attention because of the daring and unique character 
of the operations. The late summer and autumn fighting, 
further north in Flanders, could not have been so success- 
ful as they were without the taking of Vimy and Mes- 
sines Ridges. And that fighting came near to turning the 
Germans from the Flemish seacoast. 

Vimy Ridge runs from the northern end of Arras to 
the southern end of Lens. It had long been occupied by 
the Germans, who could shell the approaches to Arras on 
the north and east. The French in 1915 tried to take 
Vimy Ridge, but suffered a bloody repulse. It had to be 
attacked by troops coming from Arras, every movement 
of which would be under German observation on the Ridge 



206 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

and subjected to a withering gun-fire. The problem for 
the British was how to prepare and advance upon the 
Ridge without being seen by the Germans. 

This was accomplished by a remarkable piece of mili- 
tary engineering. The town had many deep cellars and 
excavations around it, and through the winter the two 
tunneling companies of New Zealanders constructed new 
tunnels, to which the cellars and excavations were con- 
nected. The underground stations thus prepared and 
fully equipped with water, electric lights and a tramway, 
and a dressing-station with several hundred beds, were 
able to accommodate three divisions of troops. Besides, 
over a thousand miles of twin cables for communication 
were installed, gun positions erected, emplacements for 
trench mortars, and dumps for ammunition and engineer- 
ing stores. 

Early in April everything was in readiness and an in- 
tense bombardment of the German trenches began. These 
trenches were well-nigh impregnable. The distance be- 
tween them was very short. On April 4th the British used 
a large number of Liven gas projectors, which threw 
drums of compressed gas into the Germans' second line, 
causing heavy casualties. On April 8th there was a gas 
bombardment from four-inch mortars, and early on the 
9th an avalanche of shells was poured in from a mass of 
guns. At five-thirty in the chill April dawn the men 
sprang out of their caves under Arras and assaulted the 
Ridge in successive waves. To the north and south of the 
Ridge the troops advanced to their objectives, while the 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1917 207 

Canadians captured the Ridge, and held on against the 
heaviest counter-attacks. 

A splendid victory had been achieved which was a 
great blow to the Germans. The captures made amounted 
to 13,000 men; 28 heavy guns, 130 field-guns, 84 trench- 
mortars, and 250 machine-guns. Though fighting con- 
tinued around Arras up to May, no great effort was made 
to advance on anything like the scale that had been pre- 
pared to take Vimy Ridge. The next important action 
was the capture of Messines Ridge, further to the north 
just south of Ypres. 

The German line swung in curves like the letter S in 
front of Ypres, which at the nearest point was about two 
miles away. If you reverse the letter S so, you will find 
opposite the city, located on the inside of the upper loop, 
standing off from the outside of the curve, Passchendaele 
Ridge. This Ridge figures in the Third Battle of Ypres, 
fought in the late summer and autumn, as the furthest 
advance of the British towards the Roulers-Menin road. 
In the lower loop of the letter is another ridge on the 
southern end of which is Messines, and on the northern 
end Wytschaete. This Ridge runs from a point east of 
Ypres to the river Pys in the south a distance of six miles. 
To capture the salient in which it lay the British had to 
penetrate a distance of two miles and a half to Oostta- 
verne on the eastern side. 

General Sir Hubert Plumer, who had been inactive on 
the extreme north of the Flanders front for two years, 
was in command of the operation against Messines. There 



208 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

had been no fighting in this immediate vicinity since the 
end of 1914. 

When it is said that no fighting had taken place in 
this sector since 1914, it isn't exactly true. There was no 
fighting of the ordinary sort, that is, on the surface in the 
light of day or under the cover of night. But there was a 
battle of moles going on for nearly a year or more. The 
ground beneath the British position was discovered to be 
of chalky clay, and as early as January, 1916, the British 
began, by the most expert engineers, to tunnel under the 
Ridge. Day and night these human '"moles" bored into 
the earth, often meeting with great difficulties such as 
streams of water which had to be pumped out and dammed. 
Nor were the British alone in carrying on this perilous 
work. The Germans from their side were tunneling to 
lay mines, and between the thick walls of earth each tried 
to discover the direction of the other's galleries to destroy 
the work that was done. Thus b)^ the means of camouflets, 
that is, a mine with a small charge which is intended to 
destroy the shafts where the enemy was working, and at 
the same time not make a great crater, the British and 
Germans both sought to interfere with the progress of 
each other's work. There was only one means of dis- 
covering where the enemy was tunneling and that was by 
listening. So with the most delicate instruments and 
strained nerves, the men in the dark bowels of the earth 
fought each other. They could tell with marvelous ac- 
curacy the progi'ess that was being made by the enemy, 
and wait patiently for the ripe moment to destroy all the 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1917 209 

work that had been laboriously accomplished through long 
weeks. Between January and June, down to within a day 
of the attack, twenty-seven of these camouflets were ex- 
ploded, seventeen by the British and ten by the Germans. 

The British dug twenty-four mines under ^lessines 
Ridge from end to end, and charged them with over a 
million pounds of anmional, a tremendously high ex- 
plosive. 

On the evening of June 6th a violent thunderstorm 
broke over the length of the Ridge, the heavens pounding 
with giant strokes of deafening noise as if to shut out from 
the stars the bedlam that was soon to rise from the earth. 
Between two and three on the morning of the 7th, the sky 
cleared and the moon spread a mantle of silver over the 
landscape upon which the pale glimmer of the approach- 
ing dawn began to creep. All through the night up to 
two o'clock in the morning the British bombarded the Ger- 
man positions, and they replied. The Germans were ap- 
parently ill at ease. They sent up in the gray dawn 
rockets and flames as a signal to their artillery to lay 
down a barrage. The reconnoitering airplanes and obser- 
vation balloons which began to rise from the British lines 
gave warning of something afoot. And then at ten min- 
utes past three a terrific explosion lifted the top off the 
earth at Hill 60 on the northern end of the Ridge. The 
very depths of the earth were torn and sent flying in the 
air. It was volcanic. Then before the shock had spent 
itself nineteen sheets of flames with a roar that no words 
can describe lit the Ridge from end to end. The war had 



210 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

brought many strange and terrifying sights, but no spec- 
tacle such as this had filled men's eyes. Here for miles 
the earth was lifted from its bed and suspended in the air 
where lurid flames, rocks, trees and solid masses of soil, 
with the shattered remnants of the German trenches, 
were mixed. If the sight of it was terrifying, the noise 
of the explosions was terror itself. The earth throbbed 
and quivered with agony. In London, miles away across 
land and water, and in many places in Holland, echoes 
of the explosions were heard like sullen, distant thunder. 

Just ten minutes after the mines were exploded the 
troops assaulted. Up and over the Ridge all along the 
crest the gallant men of New Zealand, Australian, Irish 
and English regiments swept, and by evening Messines 
Ridge was in British hands and the advanced lines car- 
ried towards Gaspaard and Oostaverne on the other side. 

During the next six or seven weeks the British carried 
on a series of local engagements straightening out their 
lines in front of Ypres for a general attack which opened 
the Third Battle of Ypres on July 31st. 

This battle lasted until November, when bad weather 
again stopped the British advance just as it was in sight 
of the Roulers-Menin road, the capture of which, ■' ith 
Roulers, would have turned the Germans out of their sub- 
marine bases on the Flanders coast. Zillebeke, Sanctuary 
Wood, Hooge, Zonnebeke, Poelcappelle and Passchen- 
daele Ridge were all taken in this advance after much 
difficult fighting through the mud and water of the Flem- 
ish lowlands. It was the third time the British had fought 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1917 211 

with great courage and endurance over this ground sacred 
to the memory of thousands of British dead who had suc- 
cessfully defended it against the German approach to the 
Channel. When the battle ended about November 17th, 
24,000 prisoners had been captured with 941 machine- 
guns, 74 big guns, and 138 trench-mortars. The Ger- 
mans were obliged to throw in nearly eighty divisions, 
many of which were engaged a number of times. The 
British losses were also heavj^, and though they did not 
gain all that was hoped for, all the high ground was in 
their hands, from which the enemy's movements could be 
observed and from which a new advance could be begun. 

Right on the heels of the Third Battle of Ypres came 
the Battle of Cambrai, one of the few successful surprise 
attacks of the war that was made on a big scale. In the 
north, in front of Ypres, the British had broken through 
a switch of the Hindenburg Line for a distance of over 
seven miles. In front of Cambrai the Hindenburg Line 
in its full strength was unbroken. Here was a series 
of defensive works so huge and intricate in the length and 
depth of excavations, fortified to the last detail by the 
skillful German engineers, which seemingly no attack 
wouh'"" jak. It was an impassable barricade of under- 
ground forts. If the positions themselves were impreg- 
nable they were lightly held by troops, many of which 
had been sent north to strengthen the resistance against 
the British in the Battle of Ypres. 

The British, however, in the attack upon Cambrai were 
to try a new experiment. It was a risky but worth-while 



212 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

attempt. This was to do away with the usual intensive 
preliminary artillery bombardment and send forward 
tanks to destroy the barbed-wire entanglement before the 
trenches, and subdue their defenders, thus opening the way 
for the infantry to advance. The ground on the Cambrai 
front was admirably suited for the tanks, for it was firm 
and without shell-holes over any considerable area. A 
clever device was used to help carry the tanks over the 
trenches. The forward line of tanks carried on their bows 
large logs of wood which were dropped over the trenches 
to make a bridge for the tanks to cross. This device 
worked successfully. 

Four hundred tanks were assembled for the attack, arid 
on November 20th the advance began seven miles away 
from the Hindenburg Line, from Bullecourt in the north 
to Villers-Chislain in the south. It was a complete sur- 
prise and the British reached the very gates of Cambrai, 
capturing the Hindenburg Line and Bourlon Wood on 
high ground, which was an important objective. 

The Germans, however, soon recovered from the sur- 
prise and began throwing in great forces of men on the 
northern end of the British line to recapture Bourlon 
Wood. The British made a fatal mistake in not being 
prepared to take advantage of their success. True, this 
had been far beyond their expectation, and they were quite 
as surprised as the Germans at what had taken place. The 
tanks opened great holes in the enemy's line, but there 
were not enough troops in reserve to hold the ground 
gained. A great victory was in the hands of General 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1917 213 

Byng, who was in charge of the attack. With sufficient 
reserves he could have taken Cambrai, which was only 
three miles away, an important key position that the Ger- 
mans retained after their retreat in March. But these 
troops he did not have, and by the end of November the 
Germans, with strong counter-attacks, were pushing the 
British back. By this time the initiative was in German 
hands. On the southern end of the line they had pene- 
trated three miles into the British front, retaking Villers- 
Guislain, Gonnelieu and Gouzeaucouii; and were pushing 
on to Metz when stopped and turned back. 

Heavier and more disastrous fighting, however, took 
place on the northern end of the line for the possession 
of Bourlon Wood. The Germans attacked this important 
place with determination on a four-mile front, soaked it 
with poison gas and after much hard fighting recaptured 
it. The Battle of Cambrai may be said to have been 
fought in two stages. First, the British surprise attack, 
which was very successful. It brought them a bag of 11,- 
000 prisoners and 145 guns and put the Hindenburg Line 
in their hands. Second, the counter-offensive of the Ger- 
mans, in which they claimed 6,000 prisoners and 100 guns. 
Portions of the Hindenburg Line were retaken, but the 
balance in British favor was some 11,000 yards. 

With the Battle of Cambrai, fighting on the western 
front comes to an end for the year. At Verdun all through 
the summer there had been fighting of a severe character. 
At the end of 1916 the French in two or three sharp 
thrusts of the Heights of the Meuse regained much of the 



214 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

ground and forts the Germans had taken through the pre- 
vious eight months. Through the summer in which we 
have followed the operations before Ypres, there were pro- 
longed and bloody fights on the left bank of the Meuse 
for Dead Man's Hill and Hill 304, which finally fell to 
the French and restored the situation around Verdun as it 
was before the Germans began their mighty attack in Feb- 
ruary, 1916. 

In the East 

Before turning to the most decisive battle of the year, 
overshadowing many more bitter struggles, the Italian de- 
feat at Caporetto, the events in Asia once more call for 
attention. 

In December, 1916, the British, this time under the 
command of General Stanley !Maude, were again advanc- 
ing up the Tigris on Kut-el-Amara. On February 26th 
the town was captured and General jMaude continued on 
to Bagdad, which was entered by the intrepid British com- 
mander on March 11th. At last the British had wiped out 
the shame of Townshend's surrender at Kut-el-Amara. 
Bagdad the Magnificent, the city of the fabulous Ai-abian 
Nights, ancient with lore and magic, was snatched like a 
jewel from the crown of the Turkish empire. But fhere 
lurked in the city a Captor whom no man can escape, and 
under its sway fell the brilliant British conqueror. It is 
declared that General Stanley Maude died of cholera in 
the ancient city whose sanitation it may well be believed 
was not of the best under Turkish rule. But rumor has 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1917 215 

whispered that he was poisoned through some means by 
the Germans, who, in command of the Turkish armies, did 
not lack the means for doing such an unsportsmanhke 
deed. If they thought it would stop or delay the advance 
of the British, they were much mistaken, for the British 
continued their progress for many miles on the way to 
Mosul, from which place they were to turn west, cross the 
northern end of the Arabian Desert and storied Euphrates 
River, and join General Allenby's army coming up 
through the Holy Land, at Aleppo, for a combined march 
upon Constantinople. 

General Allenby's forces, however, did not enter Pales- 
tine until March 26th. Late the year before he had driven 
the Turks from a second attack on the Suez Canal, cleared 
them out of the Sinai Peninsula, crossed the frontier and 
defeated the Turks in a pitched battle at Gaza on the sea- 
coast. Now began one of the most picturesque campaigns 
of the entire war. 

Late in November the British had reached the outskirts 
of Jerusalem and laid siege to the Holy City. On De- 
cember 8th, after holding Jerusalem for six hundred and 
seventy-three years, the Turks surrendered to the British 
general, and on the 11th General Allenby and his troops 
entered the city on foot by the Jaffa gate. Indeed, it may 
be said that this victory crowned the ninth and last Crusade 
for the Holy shrines of the Christian religion. The 
Knights of the First Crusade had knocked against the 
gates of the city with lances and spears just 818 years be- 
fore General Allenby's troops. What scenes must have 



216 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

sprung up in the minds of those soldiers from the far-away- 
modern world, which were impressed upon their memory as 
little children by their parents and Sunday school teach- 
ers: — how as the royal city of the ancient Canaanites it had 
been captured by David; how Solomon built the great 
Temple there whose glittering dome outshone the sun ; how 
the city was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, the wicked 
Babylonian king, which drove the Jews into exile, and 
how they came back and rebuilt the Sacred City. All 
these events and more are out of the Old Testament. But 
how much more deeply impressed were these soldiers of 
many western lands across continents and seas, to recall 
that they trod upon the very ground and their eyes looked 
upon the very places that were most memorable in Christ's 
ministry. That within these walls He was tried and sent to 
death, and afterwards was secretly laid in the tomb in the 
garden of the rich man, from which He arose from the 
dead, making good His prophecy, and then ascended into 
Heaven. With what reverence must those hardy soldiers 
have moved about amid these scenes of the New Testa- 
ment. How vividly they must have recalled their child- 
hood when they first learned of the Divine Son who came 
to do His Father's bidding upon earth, to comfort and 
heal, to bring love and mercy, and teach good will between 
men. And perhaps those soldiers who had left home and 
kin and all that was dear, remembered too that Christ also 
said He had come with a sword to put down the 
wicked and mighty who did wrong, and, remembering 
this, the troops must inwardly have exulted, for the reason 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1917 217 

that brought them to Jerusalem was to put down the 
wicked and mighty, who had done wrong. It must have 
been a very wonderful experience for the soldiers who 
stood in Jerusalem on the anniversary of Christ's birth 
in 1917. 

With Jerusalem in his hands General Allenby made 
it the base of his operations in Palestine to defeat the 
Turkish army. So over ground sacred in biblical history 
the campaign was carried on. The British moved north 
to Jericho and on to Samaria through the Judean hills. 
The cavalry branch of the army was used freely in this 
campaign, indeed it was one of the very few times in the 
whole war when cavalry became effective on a large scale 
of action. It swept up between the River Jordan and the 
Mediterranean Sea to Nazareth, where Christ began His 
ministry, which was captured with 18,000 prisoners, many 
guns, airplanes and military supplies. The Turks were 
now between two wings of the British army north and 
south, and with an Arabian army coming east across the 
River Jordan to cut off their escape. The German gen- 
eral, Liman von Saunders, who was in command of the 
Turkish troops, now saw their fate and in a cowardly man- 
ner deserted them with his officers, escaping just before 
the net was drawn tight. On the famous biblical field of 
Armageddon, which means the place of "the battle of the 
great day of God," on the tableland of Esdraelon in Gali- 
lee and Samaria, the Turks were crushed and the Holy 
Land forever freed from their bondage. 

The British campai.srn in Palestine began in the spring 



218 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

of 1917, but I have carried it through to the events of 
September, 1918, with the final defeat of the Turks. The 
British army in Mesopotamia, as ah-eady recorded, had 
advanced to Mosul up the Tigris, where it awaited Gen- 
eral Allenby's progress through Palestine, when both 
armies were to meet at Aleppo and advance on Constanti- 
nople. Thus the stage was set in the east for the final 
act which was but one in a series of actions which over- 
whelmed all the enemy powers with defeat. I have 
brought you thus far in the east to the end, because it was 
there far away from the center of the war in Europe that 
General Allenby won the first decisive victory, several 
days before the Allies, under General d'Esperey, broke 
Bulgaria's power, that helped to bring the war to an end. 

The Italian Defeat 

The most decisive as well as the most disastrous battle 
of the year was the defeat of the Italians by the Austro- 
Germans at Caporetto. This defeat was largely due to 
propaganda by the Germans. The Austrian and Italian 
lines, which were only a few hundred yards apart, had 
made it possible for the soldiers during periods of inac- 
tivities to become friendly. This friendliness was encour- 
aged by the Austrian and German High Command. The 
Austrian troops who had been friendly with the Italians 
were withdrawn and German shock troops took their 
places. On October 24th the attack began. The Italians 
in the front line, believing the attackers to be the friendly 
Austrians they knew, waved them a welcome. The 




Painting by F. S. Brunncr © Curtis Publishing Company 

From British Official Photograph Copyright by Underwood & Underwood. A'. )'. 
Reproduced by Permission of " The Ladies' Home Journal " 



THE END OF THE LAST CRUSADE CAME WHEN GENERAL ALLENBY 
ENTERED JERUSALEM AT THE HEAD OF THE BRITISH ARMY 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1917 219 

treacherous Germans replied with rifle and machine-gun 
fire, killing the Italians in great numbers and breaking 
through their lines. 

The first week of the advance the Italians lost more 
than 250,000 prisoners and 2,000 guns. The Italian 
armies on the front from the Carnic Alps to the sea, a 
distance of seventy miles, were forced to retreat. The 
retreat became a rout in which soldiers and civilians, stores 
and materials of all kinds got mixed, and choked up the 
roads running to the rear. Town after town fell to the 
enemy. All that the Italians had gained in their two 
years of difficult fighting was lost in as many weeks. By 
the 10th of November the Italians had crossed the Piave 
and, reenforced by British and French troops, fought a 
hard battle to keep the Germans and Austrians from cross- 
ing the river. In this they succeeded and held the line of 
the Piave safely until the following year when, under 
General Diaz, the Austrians were crushingly defeated 
and put out of the war. 

America at War 

There remains for this chapter a reference to Amer- 
ica's relations to the actual fighting that was going on in 
France. It was many months before America was to take 
an active and decisive part in the field. Her first con- 
tribution to Allied strength was naval, and this we will 
describe in the naval chapters of this narrative, but it was 
in June of 1917 that the first American troops under Gen- 



220 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

eral Pershing arrived in Europe, and on October 27th that 
the first shot was fired by our troops across the line upon 
German trenches. Late in the summer Pershing's men 
were put in the trenches in the Toul sector, south of Ver- 
dun, where they learned the method of trench warfare, 
and it was on this part of the line they first took com- 
mand of a sector when their training was completed. 

Though the Americans did no actual fighting on the 
land in 1917, they had a still larger task to perform in 
training and preparation. While cantomnents were being 
built all over the country at home, and the draft was put 
into operation for the creation of the National Army, and 
training was begun, over in Europe there was other im- 
portant work being carried on. Ports of debarkation with 
docks and wharves and storehouses had to be built. Bases 
for all sorts of supplies had to be made ready. Lines of 
railroads to the front and roads for motor transports had 
to be constructed, and all these took a great number of 
engineers and men, who in these duties were fighting the 
enemy just as much as the men who carried rifles and 
fired the guns. Indeed men of many professions and 
trades and in unskilled labor combined in a mighty effort 
to construct and prepare for the training, transportation, 
health, feeding and comfort of the millions of young men 
who were being called from their civilian occupation to 
don the uniform and fight the Germans. 

While all this was going on in the summer and autumn 
of 1917, and the winter of 1916-17, the Germans were 
also making a mighty effort behind their lines. They 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1917 221 

were building and perfecting three lines of defenses for 
an emergency against any future advances such as the 
British had made in the Battle of the Somme and which 
would enable them to retreat safely to the frontier. But 
this was not their single preparation. They were bring- 
ing all their troops from the eastern front, now that they 
were no longer needed, since Russia had made peace at 
Brest-Litovsk, and they were training them and creating 
the "shock battalions" for the great offensive that was to 
carry the Kaiser into Paris and end the war. So the race 
was on, between Germany and America, for the final test. 



CHAPTER V 

THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1918 

The German Drive 

WITH everything in readiness, the great German 
offensive, which was to end the war, began on 
JNIarch 21st. Von Hindenburg, who was not 
in favor of the attack, but believed in was better to hold the 
Allies from behind the strong fortifications he had built 
along the whole line from the North Sea to Switzerland, 
was not in direct command of the German armies. His 
lieutenant, Ludendorff, who conceived the plan of battle, 
had won the Kaiser's approval to go ahead with it, and 
so commanded the operations. He had adopted the "von 
Hutier" method of attack with shock troops, which had 
been so successfully employed by General von Hutier in 
his operations before Riga in northern Russia. 

It will be simpler for you to understand the German 
offensive if you understand at the outset its purpose, and 
the definite stages through which it progressed. Luden- 
dorff was striking for a decision. His efforts to reach this 
was to break through the front where the British and 
French armies joined, rolling the British armies north- 
ward through Amiens against the sea and defeat them, 
and then the French armies eastward against the frontier 

222 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1918 223 

and defeat them, too. Thus without opposition he could 
advance upon Paris and capture it. The battle would be 
won and Germany victorious in the war. 

Now Ludendorff won a great initial victory, destroyed 
utterly one British army and defeated others. He also de- 
feated one of the French armies, opened a great gap be- 
tween the French and British forces, and was able to reach 
a point within twenty-nine miles of Paris, — but he did not 
win the war. He struck four heavy blows in the nearly 
four months that it took him to advance to an extreme 
limit of fifty miles. The first blow of March 21st was on 
a front of fifty miles between Arras and Laon in the di- 
rection of Amiens ; the second blow of April 9th was on a 
narrow front between Meteren and Armentieres down the 
Lys valley towards the Channel Ports ; the third blow of 
3Iay 27th was on a thirty-five mile front from ^lontdidier 
to Rheims, to the Marne and on the road to Paris; and the 
fourth blow on July 15th was on a sixty-mile front from 
Chateau-Thierry to the Argonne, to take Rheims and 
swing westward on both banks of the River ISIarne on the 
way to Paris. This was the whole program which nearly 
brought the war to an end with a German victory. 

Let us follow the progress of the first blow. The Ger- 
mans, you must remember, were far superior in numbers. 
On the very first day of the attack the weight of these 
numbers gave them a momentum that nothing could stop. 
Forty German diivsions fell upon fourteen British divi- 
sions, with the concentration against General Gough's 
Fifth British Army on the southern end of the line. On 



224 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

the third day General Gough's army was shattered into 
fragments, but the fragments fought heroically until 
killed or captured. But on and on came the Germans, 
through Picardy towards the Somme, adding rnile after 
mile to their advance and taking town after town that the 
British held. Bapaume, Combles, Peronne, Ham, Noyon, 
Albert, Chaulnes, Nesle, Roye, Lassigny, Moreuil and 
Montdidier fell into their hands. The Germans had re- 
taken all the ground they gave up in the great retreat 
of the year before. As they pushed forward, their front, 
like an enormous mass of iron, ground its way southward 
by Amiens in a huge bow, the outer rim of which was but 
ten miles from the city. Fifty miles from their starting- 
point and within sight of their great objective, Amiens, 
the important junction of communications for the British 
with their bases on the Channel, the Germans were 
stopped. They almost broke through. But at this point 
a hastily gathered force of engineers and non-combatant 
laborers of all descriptions, seizing rifles and machine-guns, 
were thrown into the breach to hold back the tide until 
reenforcements could be brought up and sent in. Ameri- 
can engineers laying roads dropped their work, and, com- 
manded by General Carey, a British officer, went into the 
fight to help stop the Germans. After two or three days 
the French threw in some reserves, the gap was effectively 
filled, the British and French armies securely linked, and 
the road to Amiens blocked to the Germans forever. 

The German blow had been an immense success which 
threw a gloom over all the Allied countries. One British 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1918 225 

ariiiy was utterly destroyed, 150,000 prisoners and 2,000 
guns captured. It was a serious situation that confronted 
the Allied generals and statesmen. They realized at once 
the fatal mistake that had been made on their side. That 
was the lack of unity in command of the Allied operations. 
So the Allied commanders got together in a conference 
and agreed that Foch, the French general who had held 
the Germans before Nancy in the first days of the war, 
whose thrust at La Fere-Champenoise had been the de- 
cisive move towards victory in the Battle of the Marne, 
who on two occasions in Flanders had saved the British, 
and who in Artois and Champagne had achieved brilliant 
results, should be generalissimo of all the Allied armies 
on every front. Joffre had called Foch the "finest strate- 
gist in Europe," and in the next few months he was to 
prove it to all the world. 

General Foch was appointed the supreme commander 
on March 29th, and his first utterance was that "Amiens 
will not fall." It was the first bright hope that broke 
through the dark days that hung over England, France 
and America since the first day of the German drive. And 
Amiens did not fall! 

Another result of this successful drive by the Germans 
was to hasten the arrival of American troops upon the 
battlefield. The English Premier, Lloyd George, cabled 
President Wilson to send 120,000 American troops a 
month to France. The President replied that if England 
would loan the ships the troops would be sent. So began 
the last stage of the great race between Germany and 



226 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

America. The odds were against America because Ger- 
many in the drive just described had won the first lap. 
The genius of General Foch stood between the Kaiser's 
army and Amiens. Would it stand between it and Paris 
on any other front where the Germans with their superb 
organization and superior numbers choose to attack? 
Three thousand miles of water in which lurked the enemy's 
submarines, ready to sink without warning or mercy the 
troop-laden transports, lay between America and the bat- 
tlefields. Would the great western Republic get there 
safely and in time? That was the question all the Allied 
world was asking. Thank Heaven, it did, but at the ex- 
pense of tremendous labor. And Heaven is to be 
thanked, too, that such a soldier with the genius of Gen- 
eral Foch stood between the Germans and defeat until 
the Americans were ready, nearly three months later, to 
be sent in at the Marne to turn defeat into victory. 

We left the Germans at the end of their first blow at 
the gates of Amiens. The exertion which carried them 
fifty miles in ten days had worn them out. They were 
far beyond their supplies, ammunition and guns. In spite 
of their gains they had been badly used by the terrific fire 
of the British and French. It was necessary for them to 
stop, reorganize and replenish their units with food and 
shells. 

In the meantime another German drive was preparing 
to the north. Blocked on the Somme, Ludendorff sought 
to break through in Flanders. On Aj)ril 9th, after an un- 
successful attack against Arras, the forces of Crown Prince 



I 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1918 227 

Rupprecht smashed through on the front between Armen- 
tieres and Dixmude Ridge along the Lys valley south of 
Ypres. The advance was in a westerly direction towards 
the Channel ports. A corps of Portuguese troops was 
broken through and the Germans swept forward. All the 
important ridges that the British had captured at such 
sacrifice during the summer and autumn of the previous 
year in the Third Battle of Ypres were taken. Poel- 
cappelle, Passchendaele and Messines passed into the 
enemy's hands. Yet still further west the Germans pushed 
right up to the summit of Mt. Kemmel, the key position 
to Ypres itself. Still they did not stop, but, swaying a 
little to the south, passed beyond Merville on the road to 
Hazebrouck. The capture of this place with a further ad- 
vance westward to the range of hills, Mounts Noir, Rouge, 
Vidaigne and Scherpenberg beyond Mt. Kemmel, and the 
British would have to give up Ypres and the road opened 
to the Channel. 

At this point the famous order was issued to the British 
army in which was said, "With our backs to the wall and 
believing in the justice of our cause each of us must fight 
to the end." The British were fighting with their "backs 
to the wall," and there they stood and stopped the Ger- 
man onslaught. Three hundred and twenty square miles 
were lost to the enemy, he had captured 20,000 prisoners 
and 200 guns, but he had not taken Ypres and reached 
the Channel. So the second blow came to an end. 

The advance in Flanders as well as the advance in 
Picardy had baffled Ludendorff. He had torn great 



228 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

salients in the Allied lines, but they were unbroken. The 
Germans were now compelled to stop and take a breath 
to prepare for another attack. It was more than a month 
before this took place. 

In the meantime the Allies made a few attempts to 
straighten out the line in front of Montdidier to strengthen 
their positions. One of these operations was carried out 
by American troops in what was practically their first ad- 
vance. They were sent against the town of Cantigny, 
which was taken with splendid courage and dash. It was 
a promise of the mettle in the American soldier that later 
was to win such admiration from the veterans of France 
and England. 

On ]May 27th Ludendorff let loose his third blow on a 
forty-mile front, which was in the shape of a bow from 
Montdidier to Chateau-Thierry. This blow was followed 
by a supplementary attack on June 9th, which came down 
from the river Aisne. Together they were intended as 
one great drive to the Marne. 

The Germans tore through the front between Soissons 
and Rheims, advanced thirty miles to the Marne and 
crossed the river at and about Chateau-Thierry, and stood 
upon the road to Paris. The French front was also 
broken to the east of Rheims, where the Germans drove 
over the strong natural positions on the Chemin des Dames 
which General Maistre's troops had taken in 1917. Sois- 
sons was now again in German hands. The rivers Vesle 
and Ourcq were behind the Germans' front line and the 
Marne was crossed. This third blow of Ludendorff's was 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1918 229 

as disastrous as the first blow down the Somme valley in 
Picardy, and the world began to wonder what General 
Foch was doing to let him come on in this fashion. But 
the great commander knew what he was about, and, like 
Joffre at the first Battle of the Marne, was biding his 
time. 

But this second battle of the Marne will be ever mem- 
orable in the annals of America's military history. It will 
ever be gratefully remembered by our AUies as well, for 
at Chateau-Thierry the American Marines filled the gap 
that stopped the German march to Paris. Brought to the 
front in motor-vehicles, they went into action on June 6th 
and poured a withering machine-gun fire into the German 
ranks as they came across the old stone bridge that spanned 
the Marne in Chateau-Thierry. They fought with great 
bravery until the French engineers came and blew up the 
bridge, killing and drowning a large number of German 
soldiers who were crowding across on it. 

But not only here at Chateau-Thierry did the Ameri- 
cans fight. At some places the Germans were across the 
Marne on the road that ran to Paris. General Pershing 
had sent the Second and Third Divisions to support the 
French along the Marne, and at Belleau Wood the men 
of these divisions, made up of regulars and battahons of 
the Marine Corps, engaged and defeated a determined 
German attack. The French were very much pleased 
with the success of the Americans, because Belleau Wood, 
right on the road to Paris, in the hands of the Germans 
would have given them a great advantage in holding open 



230 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

the way to the capital for the next advance. In honor 
of this great service to their defense the French renamed 
the wood "Bois de la Brigade de Marine," that is, the 
"Wood of the Marine Brigade." 

Another incident happened in the American fighting 
along the Marne during this drive. General Omar Bundy 
who was in command of the Second Division was ordered 
by the French to retire, but replied that it was unthinkable 
that the American flag should retreat, as such a thing 
would be humiliating to his country's honor and that it 
was his purpose to counter-attack. This plea must have 
convinced the superior French command that such spirit 
could not be defeated, and led it to countermand the order 
with the permission to attack. That it was successful is 
shown by the fact that the Germans were not able to pass 
the Americans in the Chateau-Thierry sector. 

The third German blow thus came to an end. The par- 
ticipation of the Americans at Chateau-Thierry gave evi- 
dence that they were in the war at last. The results that 
attended their first determined fighting must have filled 
the Germans with concern. Ludendorff must have seen 
that the race was slipping from him. His intelligence de- 
partment was obliged to tell him that the troops of Uncle 
Sam were pouring into the trenches with ever increasing 
speed and in ever larger numbers. If he was to gain a de- 
cision before it was absolutely too late, it had to be done 
before General Pershing's army was ready to strike as a 
unit. So he made one more gamble and struck the fourth 
blow. 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1918 231 

This blow fell on July 15th on a sixty-mile front from 
Chateau-Thierry to the Argonne on the east of Rheims. 
It had a two-fold purpose. It was to move in two immense 
waves, one was to break through on the east and west of 
Rheims, take that city, then spread out into a second wave 
swinging westward on both banks of the Marne and stand 
in a position for the final blow upon Paris. It was a gigan- 
tic movement conceived on Napoleonic lines, and to make 
it successful Ludendorff threw in his last reserves. But 
the blow failed. Between Rheims and the Argonne Gen- 
eral Gouraud defeated Ludendorff 's left wing; between 
Rheims and Chateau-Thierry the Germans gained a little 
ground at great cost as General Mangin's troops slowed 
them down. By July 18th Ludendorff had, as they say, 
shot his bolt. All along the front the Germans were 
brought to a standstill. The mighty miHtary power of 
the Kaiser was dazed and unbalanced. Before Luden- 
dorff could think, his armies were struck a blow from which 
they never recovered. 

You will remember a little while back when the Ger- 
mans made their thirty-five-mile drive towards the Marne 
at Chateau-Thierry, all the AUied world began to question 
w^hat General Foch was doing to stop them on the way to 
Paris. He was now to answer that question, and to answer 
it in a fashion that set those same questioners wild with 

delight. 

The Germans had become drunk with their successes. 
They thought that General Foch had no reserves left after 
throwing in reenforcements to stop the drives in Picardy, 



232 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

in Flanders and down the Oise valley. The fact that 
Americans had been thrown in around Chateau-Thierry 
proved that General Foch was desperate and did not know 
where to look for reenforcements, if he was compelled to 
take these partially trained troops to help hold the Ger- 
mans back. 

But General Foch had not used anywhere near the 
number of American troops that General Pershing had 
placed at his command. He held these in reserve for a 
definite purpose. And he added to them British troops 
which he drew from the Flanders and Picardy fronts, 
making those fronts dangerously thin. If the Germans 
had only known this ! It was a daring move, only such a 
move as a soldier of supreme genius would make. And of 
General Foch's genius there was no doubt after July 18, 
1918. He had created an army where none had existed, 
and was to use it in a way that sent a thrill of enthusiasm 
through all the Allied countries — and — which sent a wave 
of terror through Ludendorff, his imperial master the 
Kaiser and all his generals. 

Well, we know that Foch had a new army, but what 
were the circumstance which made him use it with such 
confidence of success. The circumstance was this. Luden- 
dorff, drunk with his successes and believing that Foch had 
no reserves, had left one of his flanks exposed. The Ger- 
mans were in a deep salient whose base ran from the river 
Aisne just west of Soissons to Rheims, a distance of thirty 
miles. Its top or point was at Chateau-Thierry over thirty 
miles deep and resting on the river Marne. On the west- 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1918 233 

ern side the entire flank was exposed, and on July 18th 
Foch threw in his reserves from the Aisne to the Marne, 
and the salient caved in. Day after day the French, Brit- 
ish and Americans advanced. When the attack from the 
western flank got well started Foch attacked on the east- 
ern side from Rheims to Dormans. The Germans were 
now in a bad hole and for days it was a question whether 
they could pull the larger part of their armies out and 
escape capture. They had to abandon great stores of 
material and ammunition on the retreat, and they lost 
heavily in killed and captured as the Allies drove them 
across the Ourcq and Vesle rivers and finally beyond the 
Aisne. 

The German drive was now at an end. The ofl'ensive 
had passed from Ludendorff to Foch. Another great bat- 
tle was soon to begin, a battle for a decision, fought with 
different methods than the sledge-hammer blows which 
Ludendorff had swung against the Allies four times in 
nearly four months, methods which were going to bring 
the decision aimed at, and end the war. But before we 
follow Foch's battles, let us turn to the other fronts in 
Italy, in the Balkans, and in western Asia, and see how 
the enemy crumbled before the Allies on the far-distant 
wings of the gigantic battle that Foch carried in his head. 

Victory in the Balkans 

The Balkan front had been quiet for two years. Our 
last peep into these regions saw the Serbs back in Monastir 



234 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

at the bend of the Cerna river. The great Army of the 
Orient which had been gathered at Salonica at the head of 
the Gulf of Salonica in Greek Macedonia, did not dare to 
move on any large scale towards the Bulgarian border 
owing to the danger of King Constantine attacking it in 
the rear. But the patience of the Allies became worn out 
by the treachery of this pro-German king, and forced his 
abdication. Free of Constantine, and with his second son, 
Alexander, on the throne, there was nothing to fear. Alex- 
ander's sympathies were with the Allies and he imme- 
diately called the popular Venizelos to form a cabinet and 
carry on war against Bulgaria. 

General Sarrail had been replaced by General d'Espe- 
rey as commander of the army at Salonica. 

On September 14th General d'Esperey attacked the 
Bulgarians from Monastir to the Bulgarian border. On 
the extreme left of the line were the Italians, one army 
moving north along the Albanian frontier, and another 
coming east through Albania. Next were the Serbs and 
French who advanced upon Uskub. The center was held 
by the Serbians who were to take Prilip. On the right 
were the British and Greek who advanced up the Vardar 
Valley towards Lake Doiran near the Bulgarian frontier. 
Opposed to the Allies were two Bulgarian armies, one in 
the west and another in the east. It was the purpose of 
General d'Esperey to divide these armies and defeat them. 
Bulgaria had to meet this attack all by herself, as both 
her stronger allies, Germany and Austria, were busily 
engaged in France and Italy. 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1918 235 

General d'Esperey's forces were successful from the 
start. The Bulgarian army in the west was defeated and 
attempted to escape and join with the Bulgarians in the 
east. But the British and Greeks had made a rapid ad- 
vance up the Vardar Valley and were soon across the Bul- 
garian frontier and in possession of Strumnitza. This was 
on September 26th. By the 30th, Uskub had fallen, and 
the Bulgarians sued for peace. 

The first Hnk in the Teutonic alliance was broken. 
Turkey was separated from Germany, and Austria open 
to invasion. The AlHes swept through Albania, northern 
Serbia and Montenegro, driving out the Austrians and 
Germans. Nish was retaken and a portion of the Berlin- 
to-Bagdad railroad was once more in Allied hands. The 
Serbians crossed the Danube and stood upon Austrian soil. 
This invasion of Austria by the Serbs was the last act that 
determined Austria to follow Bulgaria's example and sue 
for peace. For the earlier acts we shall now have to turn 
to the Italian front and describe the defeat that had over- 
taken the Austrians at the hands of General Diaz. 

The Victory in Italy 

After his troops had been stopped in Flanders, Luden- 
dorff sought to draw attention from the western front 
awhile by ordering the Austrian armies to attack along 
the Piave River. What the Austrians had attempted to 
do in bringing disaster to the Isonzo armies of Italy in 
1916, they tried now to do to the Italian armies in the 
Trentino. General Diaz had reorganized the Italians after 



236 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

the terrible disaster at Caporetto, and with French and 
British divisions were quite able to deal with the Austrian 
offensive. The Austrians crossed the Piave at a number 
of places, but within a week General Diaz drove them back 
with tremendous losses. So the lines of the opposing 
forces stood until late in October. 

As General Foch had sent the Army of the Orient 
against the Bulgarians as a part of his final campaign 
against the enemy alliance, so now he ordered the Italians 
to move against the Austrians on the whole length of the 
Piave from the Adriatic Sea to the mountains. The Allied 
Commander-in-Chief chose well the time of attack. There 
were two million Austrian troops along the Piave, and 
they had to be supplied with food and munitions from 
across the mountains in the north. The winter comes early 
in the mountains making it extremely difficult for trans- 
portation. 

The Italian attack opened with tremendous fury and 
advanced towards the northeast where the troops of Gen- 
eral Diaz broke through at Vittorio and Langarone, 
separating the Austrian armies along the river from those 
in the mountains. The Italians had taken 400,000 pris- 
oners, 7,000 guns, and enormous quantities of stores and 
ammunition. On October 29th, the Austrians offered to 
surrender, but General Diaz demanding more proof than 
an officer with a white flag, refused to recognize the ap- 
peal. But the following day a delegation of Austrians 
crossed the Italian front at Rovereto and met General 
Diaz. An armistice was granted the Austrians, who sur- 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1918 237 

rendered unconditionally, and Austria was out of the war. 
It was a glorious day for Italy. The redemption of the 
Itahan provinces of Trent and the Istrian Peninsula was 
complete after more than half a century of hope and 
aspiration. The second of Germany's AUies had deserted 
her because it was necessary. Bulgaria and Austria were 
broken and helpless and there was nothing else for them 
to do but yield to the conquerer. Only Turkey remained, 
between whom and Germany were two utterly crushed 
partners. This made her helpless too, and if we turn to 
the east for a moment we will see that just as the Itahans 
were crushing the Austrians on the Piave, the Turks were 
preparing to give up the forlorn struggle in Asia. 

Unlike the circumstances which forced Bulgaria and 
Austria to surrender, it was a threat more than anything 
else which brought the Turks to terms. They did not have 
to fight another battle to know they were defeated. Driven 
out of Palestine and Mesopotamia the Turkish armies were 
fleeing back to Constantinople in a wild and chaotic state. 
Even in the north, in the Caucasus, where the Russian ad- 
vance had long ago crumbled and the Turks had retaken 
much ground without opposition, the Moslem troops were 
demoralized. 

The surrender of Bulgaria had opened a way for a 
European attack upon Constantinople, and already Gen- 
eral d'Esperey's Army of the Orient was preparing to ad- 
vance upon the city. 

The British army in Mesopotamia under General Mar- 
shall we last met with at Mosul on the Tigris, miles and 



238 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

miles beyond Bagdad, waiting for General Allenby to 
come up through Palestine. After the defeat of the Turks 
on the field of Armageddon towards the end of September, 
General Allenby advanced and reached Damascus in 
Syria by October first. Now both the British generals 
started on the march to Aleppo where they were to join 
forces and move northwestward through Asia Minor upon 
Constantinoi)le. 

When the Turks saw the Allies creeping and closing 
in upon their capital from the east and the west they gave 
up the fight. On October 12th the Turks sent General 
Townshend, the British general whom they had captured 
at Kut-el-Amara, to the Admiral in command of the Brit- 
ish Mediteranean fleet, with an offer to surrender. The 
terms were arranged and on October 31st an armistice was 
signed and Turkey was out of the war. 

Foch's Battles of ''Two Blows and a Kick'' which 
Brought Victory 

We left the western front just as Foch in his counter- 
offensive of July 18th had driven the Germans out of the 
Marne salient back to the Aisne river. Now was to begin 
the greatest battle in all history, the battle which I have 
called "Two Blows and a Kick." I will tell you why I 
have given it this name. 

It is said that some one asked General Foch, right after 
the Second Battle of the Marne, how he was going to whip 
the Germans. The great soldier could only express him- 
self in one way, in giving an answer. The reason was, the 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1918 239 

thing was too immense to be put in words to be understood. 
So General Foch answered the question with gestures. He 
doubled his fist and swung his right hand to the left, and 
then his left hand to the right, and then raised his right 
foot in a sharp, vicious kick. 

What he meant was that he would hit the Germans a 
blow on the right, then a blow on the left, then a kick in 
the center which would send them out of France. And 
this is exactly what he did. Only just as he raised his toe 
for the final kick, the Germans, knowing what was to come, 
fell down on their knees and begged for mercy. And the 
great soldier granted them mercy, not because they did 
not deserve the punishment he had the power to give them, 
but because he did not wish for the sake of glory, not even 
for the sake of the everlasting renown that would have 
been his, in winning the most tremendous battle of all 
history with the destruction and capture of millions of 
men, to sacrifice needlessly the lives of his own soldiers. 
He was satisfied merely to take the victory and win the 
war for the Allies. And he knew that Germany was as 
completely crushed when her armies surrendered, still or- 
ganized and well-equipped, as she would be if he had killed 
half of them and captured the rest. In fact it was a great 
humiliation for the proud and arrogant soldiers of the 
Kaiser, a far more bitter disgrace for the Kaiser himself 
and his vain and brutal generals, to surrender. General 
Foch's victory was no less glorious and immortal since he 
crowned it with a humane desire. Indeed, it was greater 
because he brought a war that was filled with horror and 



240 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

unspeakable suffering to an end with the healing thoughts 
of mercy. 

To fully understand Foch's battles of blows and a kick 
it is necessary to compare his methods with those of his 
opponent LudendorfF. Ludendorff's purpose was to 
strike with gigantic sledge-hammer blows, with the hope 
that one of them would smash completely through the 
Allied lines and destroy armies in one drive. This method 
was typical of the German mind, which is mechanical. 
Often approaching near to success, the method never quite 
succeeded, because there were always fatal weaknesses 
which broke down the organization of the drive. Human 
endurance can only reach to a certain pitch and then it col- 
lapses. And the rigid machinery of Germany's military 
organization had, after all, to depend upon the human 
element. It broke when the human element became ex- 
hausted. 

The fatal weaknesses of the great German drives of 
Ludendorff which almost won the war but didn't, and 
ended in complete disaster, was in the human element. A 
machine is no good without fuel. Let us say the German 
army was like an automobile that has been supplied with 
gasoline to run a hundred miles. At the end of a hundred 
miles it stops because the gasoline has given out. It is 
on a lonely country road where no gasoline can be ob- 
tained. But a hundred miles back from where it started 
is a horse-driven wagonload which is on the way with an- 
other supply. The automobile simply has to wait until 
the wagon reaches it. Then it can go on. But in the 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1918 241 

meantime all sorts of things might happen, which even 
with the gasoline might prevent the automobile from con- 
tinuing its journey. Its failure was thus due to the cause 
of fuel. 

LudendorfF's military machine in the offensive of 1918 
outran its fuel. While it waited the Allies prepared to 
deal with it, that is, to destroy it. 

Foch's methods were altogether different. His final 
object was the same as Ludendorff's, but he fought a long 
series of sharp engagements, in none of which he exhausted 
his fuel, and which were but the gathering of the storm 
that was to break with a final and decisive blow. There 
was no pause between these engagements, so the enemy 
never had any rest, and was thus unable to pull himself 
together for a strike-back. These battles were for the 
security of position, so when the time for the final blow 
came there would be no weak spot, no exposed flanks, such 
as Ludendorff created for himself in the Marne salient, 
for the enemy to attack. First on one wing, and then on 
the other, Foch struck, pushing back the Germans all dur- 
ing August, September and October of 1918, bottling 
Ludendorff's armies up for the final and decisive blow. 
That blow the Germans knew would destroy and capture 
all their armies, and bring about the greatest military dis- 
aster in history, a Sedan fifty or a hundred times multi- 
plied, and so Ludendorff had nothing else to do but sur- 
render. 

Now let us sketch an outline, or rather indicate the 
stages of Foch's battles and then describe how they were 



242 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

carried out by the generals and armies under his command. 

The whole series of engagements which opened Foch's 
campaign on August 8th are so closely interwoven that it is 
difficult to follow them as separate developments such as 
was found to be true of Ludendorff's four blows. Foch 
had a purpose that was very evident to all, when he began 
his attacks on August 8th. It was that the Germans 
should not be allowed to reach the Hindenburg Line, from 
which they started the great offensive of March 21st, in 
such a condition as to be able to stand and defend it. After 
Ludendorff's defeat in the Marne salient, the German 
army turned from his policy of offense to von Hinden- 
burg's policy of defense along the whole length of the Hin- 
denburg Line. Foch knew this, and he knew, the Hinden- 
burg Line being well-nigh impregnable, that if a strong 
group of German armies reached it unbeaten it would be 
beyond the task o fthe Allies to break the Line before the 
winter set in and the campaign came to an end. The Ger- 
mans on the other hand knew that if they could reach the 
Hindenburg Line without serious defeats or losses before 
winter, they could hold it, repair their armies during the 
winter and look forward with some measure of hope to the 
campaign of 1919. 

The summer was fast slipping away and with the ex- 
perience of the previous two autumns approaching early 
with winter on their heels, to put an end to extensive opera- 
tions, Foch had to act quickly and steadily to gain his end. 
And this end was nothing less than beating the Germans 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1918 243 

thoroughly before they could reach the Hindenburg Line, 
take it along its entire length, and so end the war. 

Now the Hindenburg Line was not, as you may sup- 
pose, a single line of strongly fortified trench systems. 
There were more than twenty of these single lines, them- 
selves protected by trench systems fortified down to the 
last scientific detail of modern war, which ran across 
France and Flanders from Verdun to Arras. On some 
parts of the front the Allies were behind the Hindenburg 
Line but as long as the Germans held it at the most vital 
points the Allies could not take advantage of their posi- 
tion. At the north in front of Arras, in the east in front 
of Verdun, and in the center in front of Cambrai, the Line 
was most strongly protected, and it was at these points 
that the beaten Germans fought with such desperation dur- 
ing the latter part of September and up to the middle of 
October. But Foch had beaten them so badly before they 
reached the Hindenburg Line, that in spite of their des- 
perate efforts the Germans had to yield. 

Now there were six concerted movements, — they can't 
be called offensives such as Ludendorff made in his March- 
to-July drive, — because they were linked up with a con- 
tinuous advance along the entire Allied front — which 
pointed to clearly defined objectives. These five move- 
ments were not independent operations, but the strokes 
made possible by a continuous number of operations. The 
simplest way to understand the great plan of General 
Foch's strategy is to take a clock that strikes on the quarter 
hour. Twelve o'clock we will say represents the defeat 



244 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

of the Germans in the Marne sahent. The forces are 
balanced. At a minute past is Foch's attack of August 
8th from Amiens to Montdidier, and the minutes to quar- 
ter-past represent various attacks and advances. At 
quarter-past the hour the clock strikes once, and that rep- 
resents the attack of August 23d when the British ad- 
vanced between Arras and the Somme in the north, pene- 
trating the German right wing. Now the minutes are roll- 
ing to the half hour, representing a continued attack all 
along the line. The clock strikes a second time for the half 
hour, and this represents the blow of September 18th for 
Cambrai in the center. Now the minutes begin to mount 
up the other side of the clock, and not only minutes but 
seconds now represent the rapidly increasing attacks Foch 
is making all along the line. Between half-j)ast and a 
quarter of the hour, the Commander-in-Chief has made 
two heavy strokes; on September 26th, he sends the Amer- 
icans under General Pershing forward from Rheims to 
Verdun into the Argonne to break the Hindenburg Line 
in the east. Two days later, on September 28th, the An- 
glo-Belgian armies are ordered to advance from Ypres to 
the North Sea. Then on the stroke of the three-quarter 
hour, while all the armies are advancing on the north and 
east from Cambrai, the British and Americans attack in 
the center between Cambrai and St. Quentin, the strongest 
portion of the entire German line. This is the hour stroke. 
The Hindenburg Line is captured from end to end. 
Pershing is beyond it and through the Argonne on the 
right wing, on the way to Sedan, shutting off the German 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1918 245 

line of retreat to the frontier from Maubeuge, through 
Mezieres and Sedan to Metz. The Anglo-Belgian armies, 
which advanced on September 28th from Ypres to the 
North Sea, broke through on the left wing, shutting off 
the only other line of German retreat to the frontier from 
Lille through Namur and Liege. These were the only two 
avenues of escape the Germans had with perfect railway 
communications. Between these lines of retreat was the 
Forest of the Ardennes, a wide stretch of mountainous 
country through which it was impossible for the large 
masses of German troops to pass. 

Another fact should be considered in connection with 
the Ardennes and the role that was given the American 
troops to take in this great battle. Behind the Hinden- 
burg Line in the north through Belgium the Germans had 
three lines of defenses to the river Meuse which runs down 
the eastern corner of Belgium by Liege, from which place 
it turns southwest to Namur, then south to Sedan, and on 
southeast to Verdun. The Meuse was the last defensive 
line of the Germans in Belgium and France. Two other 
lines to the west came down through Belgium and all three 
lines converged into one to the north of Verdun before 
the Maubeuge- Sedan-Metz railroad, and protected Metz. 
This line was the famous Kriemhilde Stellung on the 
northern edge of the Argonne and before Grand Pre. On 
it the Germans made their heaviest concentration of troops 
because it was through here lay the road to the Rhine and 
an invasion of Germany and the investment of Metz. 
Once this line was broken the Germans would be crowded 



246 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

against the wall of the Ardennes Forest and cut off from 
escape. 

The tremendous task which General Foch called upon 
the Americans to accomplish was to push through the 
Forest of the Argonne, a gigantic task, then break through 
the Kriemhilde Stellung, capture Grand Pre, and then ad- 
vance upon and take Sedan, The entire success of Foch's 
campaign depended upon the Americans accomplishing 
this task. To the glory of the American officers and troops 
be it said, they fulfilled what was expected of them to the 
utmost. It was a particular honor and trust for which the 
Americans were chosen, and they proved that neither was 
misplaced by General Foch. The Battle of the Argonne 
and the breaking of the Kriemhilde Stellung, or Kriem- 
hilde Position, was the decisive advance which won Foch's 
great battle and brought victory to the Allies, just as 
surely as his own attack at La Fere-Champenoise was the 
decisive stroke which won the First Battle of the Marne. 

Let us go back to August 8th, when the British Fourth 
Army under General Rawlinson attacked on a twenty- 
five-mile front from Amiens to Montdidier. The success of 
this advance was immediate and large. The British went 
forward eleven miles, taking Montdidier, and made a haul 
of 17,000 prisoners and 200 guns. The next two weeks 
the attack spread to the north and east of Amiens so that 
the whole front from Arras to Soissons was pushing for- 
ward. In the north the line had reached Beaumont-Hamel 
and in the east Lassigny. The Allies had now sliced off 
the top of the German salient in Picardy. 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1918 247 

On August 23d the British began a big attack on a 
thirty-mile front from the Somme below Albert to Arras, 
capturing Bray, Thiepval and a number of strong posi- 
tions all the way to the river Scharpe, with thousands of 
prisoners. The following day the French and Americans 
moved forward on the front between Soissons and Rheims 
towards the river Aisne. On the 26th the British were 
continuing astride the Scarpe taking many towns and 
striking at the Hindenburg Line between Arras and Lens. 
Further to the south the French on the 27th and 28th had 
taken Roye and were working towards Ham and Noyon, 
advancing towards the Ailette river to get around the 
western edge of the Forest of St. Gobain. 

These constant attacks on the German line forced a 
retreat on August 31st in Flanders south of Ypres when 
Mt. Kemmel was given up. On September 2d, the retreat 
was extended on a fifty-mile front from Ypres to Peronne, 
and again on September 5th the retreat continued on a 
wide front of 150 miles from Rheims to the sea. While 
this latter retreat was in progress the Americans attacked 
west of Rheims and kept the Germans on the move, driv- 
ing them from the Vesle at Fismes to and across the Aisne. 

On September 12th the French and Americans at- 
tacked on both sides of the St. Mihiel salient, preparatory 
to the first independent offensive of the Americans in 
France. This took place the next day when General Per- 
shing's First American Army wiped out the St. Mihiel 
salient in one of the most brilliant attacks of the war. 
Though this was not a major operation it had an impor- 



248 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

tance of major operations. The Germans had held the St. 
Mihiel salient ever since the first months of the war and 
one or two bloody attempts by the French had failed to 
drive them out. The Americans did their job so swiftly 
and cleanly that it won the admiration of the Allied chiefs 
and filled the people at home with pride. In a little more 
than a day 180 square miles of territory were recovered for 
France, besides the capture of 20,000 prisoners and 200 
guns, and immense stores of supplies and ammunition. 

The wiping out of the St. Mihiel salient brought the 
Americans near the French border opposite Metz, the 
outer forts of which soon began to taste the effect of shells 
from the guns of the American artillery. But more than 
that, it brought the Americans face to face with the hardest 
test of their experience in the war. All along the battle- 
front from Flanders to Verdun American troops were in 
battle as were the British and French, and much praise 
they received from the British and French generals for 
their achievements. But here before the Argonne, a fur- 
nace of German steel, the Americans were to win undying 
glory for valor and endurance as an independent army. 
All Americans should be justly proud of what their troops 
accomplished during the two weeks it took to clear the 
Argonne, foot by foot almost, of the determined Ger- 
mans. They seemed fully to realize how much depended 
on breaking through here, for not only was General Gou- 
raud advancing northward from the east of Rheims to join 
in carrying the line forward toward Mezieres and Sedan, 
but all along the front to the North Sea the development 



THE CAMPAIGNS OF 1918 249 

of Foch's campaign depended upon the success of the 
Americans. With General Gouraud was a division of 
colored troops who fought with gallantry, one of its regi- 
ments being decorated. In the Argonne, too, were colored 
troops of whom America has just reason to be proud. 
There were no better troops in Europe, and when the 
colored officer was given an opportunity, he proved his 
talents and efficiency. 

Though it was on October 10th that the Americans 
came out on the northern edge of the Argonne and stood 
to attack Grand Pre, two days earlier, confident of Gen- 
eral Pershing's ultimate success, Foch ordered an attack 
between Cambrai and St. Quentin, the strongest link in 
the Hindenburg Line in the north. This blow came as the 
cumulation of attacks that began on September 18th 
against the Hindenburg Line north of St. Quentin, during 
which the Americans under General Rawlinson fought so 
gallantly at Guillemont Farm. It was followed by the 
Anglo-Belgian offensive of September 28th, which reached 
the Roulers-Menin Road. On October 3d the Germans 
evacuated Lens and Armentieres, and on the 9th Cambrai 
was taken. The French south of Laon had crossed the 
Ailette and forced the Germans to retreat from the Chemin 
des Dames. On the 14th of October the Allies on a front 
from the Lys river south of Ypres northward, advanced 
towards Ghent and Courtrai. The same day the Germans 
began another wide retreat, giving up Laon, the last cor- 
nerstone but one of their defensive system in France, La 
Fere and many other strongholds. Three days later Lille 



250 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

was captured by the British. The two wings of Foch's 
front were now closing in on the Germans and threatening 
both lines of their retreat. On October 7th President Wil- 
son had received from Prince Max, the imperial German 
chancellor, proposals for an armistice, which were prompt- 
ly rejected, with the suggestion, however, that the proper 
person to receive such proposals was General Foch. 

All along the line the Allies were moving forward 
rapidly on four fronts. On November 7th the Germans 
sent to Foch for armistice terms and he received a Ger- 
man delegation the next day at Senlis — a ruined village 
in the Forest of Compiegne. Still the Allies swept on and 
when at eleven o'clock on the morning of November 11th, 
the armistice was signed, the Canadians had entered Mons, 
the British had taken Valenciennes and Maubeuge, and 
the American troops had captured and raised the Amer- 
ican flag over Sedan. 



PART IV 
THE NAVIES IN ACTION 



CHAPTER I 

THE NAVIES! IN 1914 

THE naval history of the war is far less important 
form the point of view of action than in the in- 
fluence of sea power. The word sea power 
means something that cannot be grasped very easily. 
When I tell you that it was sea power that won the war, 
you will most likely be surprised, yet without it, the Allied 
nations would not have won. If Germany and her asso- 
ciates had driven every one of the Allied soldiers out of 
Europe and Asia, it would have given her a great military 
victory; but yet with sea power on the side of the defeated 
nations, she would not have won the war. This may be 
very hard to understand ; but it is, nevertheless, true. The 
nations of the world live not by themselves, but through 
their intercourse with one another; and the pathway of 
this intercourse is over the seas. Whoever commands the 
seas, commands victory; and sea power, a great silent 
weight, was on the side of the Allies. 

The great British navy was the cornerstone of this 
power. Combined with the French navy during the first 
year or two of the war, they were immensely superior to 
the navies of Germany, Austria, and Turkey. When 
Italy came into the war and then America, the weight and 

253 



254 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

power of this combination greatly increased. There was 
very little sea fighting on a large scale and of a decisive 
nature. There was only one major naval battle, and that, 
perhaps the greatest one in history, was the Battle of 
Jutland, but there was going on all the time a mar- 
velous activity, crowded with innumerable incidents diffi- 
cult to imagine. In such ways it was that the sea power 
of the Allies was exercised ; but it will be a long time be- 
fore the full history of this silent but hidden work of the 
navies can be written. Day after day, night after night 
through the warmth and cold of the seasons of the year, 
the watchful navies were on duty. Upon them, as was 
said, depended the intercourse of the nations associated 
in the war. This intercourse was more vitally necessary 
in war times than in peace. More necessary because there 
was never so much freight to be transported to the various 
war fronts as well as millions upon millions of troops. 

From the very beginning of the war, the proud Ger- 
man navy, very strong in itself, was obliged to keep under 
cover of its own coasts. For a few months, a number of 
cruisers and raiders, that is, ships that destroy commerce, 
were at large ; but they were run down, sunk, or captured. 
That is why in the beginning of 1915, Germany, being 
perfectly helpless with her big ships on the sea, developed 
her submarines and began the undersea warfare. She 
did it in such a manner as to disregard all the international 
rules of naval warfare. Thus a new element of danger, 
which the Allies had not reckoned with, came into exist- 
ence. They were unprepared to meet it, and great losses 



THE NAVIES IN 1914 255 

were suffered by the merchant marine of all the nations. 
Another element of danger which the Germans developed 
was the mine field which she not only laid along her own 
coast for protection, but strewed about the seas wherever 
she thought they could damage shipping and the war- 
ships of the Allies. Some of these mines v/ere stationary 
and some floating, and either kind was very dangerous be- 
cause it was never known exactly where the mines were. 

Now let us see what it was the navies had to do in their 
silent work. All the big warships such as the dread- 
noughts, the battleships and the cruisers of various classes 
were divided into squadrons and stationed at certain bases 
where they were always ready to dash forth and fight. 
These squadrons accompanied by destroyers and torpedo 
boats would run out to sea every once and a while, with 
the hope of running across the enemy. This was par- 
ticularly true of the British Grand Fleet in the North Sea 
whose base was in Scapa Flow in the north of Scotland. 
Its first and only duty was to encounter and destroy the 
German High Seas Fleet, if it ever came out of the Baltic. 
It did come out once, as we shall see, and fought the great- 
est sea battle ever fought. Other squadrons of the French, 
Italian and American navies, were stationed at other bases 
off the coast of Ireland, along the French coast, and in the 
Mediteranean and Adriatic Seas. Perhaps next to the 
Jutland fight, the greatest action of the war was the com- 
bined attack of British and French warships upon the 
Turkish forts at the Dardanelles. 

But mostly these great squadrons were silent and 



256 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

watchful. There were, however, a number of large war- 
ships that were used for convoying and these went to all 
parts of the world. 

There was scarcely any coastline on either side of the 
Atlantic where England did not have some of her war- 
ships. The French navy guarded the Mediterranean Sea, 
while the Japanese navy guarded the Pacific Ocean in the 
far east. But the small craft, — the destroyers, the torpedo 
boats, the patrol boats, mine layers, converted cruisers, 
auxiliaries, submarines, trawlers, mine sweepers, light 
armored cruisers, and motor boats, — these were the boats 
that toiled silently in the seas through all weathers doing 
dangerous and heroic work. Their story can only be 
guessed at, never fully told, so we must leave them until, 
little by little, time yields up their chronicles from the offi- 
cial records of the various nations. Our present purpose 
is to follow the more conspicuous events at sea from the 
beginning of the war to the end of 1914. There was much 
activity during these few months, because a number of 
German ships were still at large all over the world, in the 
Atlantic, in the JNIediteranean, in the Pacific, and their 
deeds make an interesting story. 

During these months, only three naval engagements 
were fought, the action in Helgoland Bight, the battle off 
Coronel in the Pacific off the coast of South America, and 
the Battle of Falkland Islands in the Atlantic off the 
eastern coast of South America. Before describing these, 
there are the exploits of the German cruisers and raiders 



THE NAVIES IN 1914 257 

to consider, which make one of the most romantic pages in 
the naval story of the war. 

The most notable is the case of the Goehen and 
Breslau, two German cruisers in the Mediterranean which, 
at the outbreak of hostilities, managed to elude the Brit- 
ish and French warships by a very clever scheme. These 
ships had bombarded Bona and PHilippeville on the Alge- 
rian coast, after which they flew to Messina, an Italian 
port. This was a neutral port, and the German ships had 
to leave within twenty-four hours. They seemed doomed 
to be captured by the British and French warships which 
waited for them outside. The British were certain that 
the German ships would make a dash for the Adriatic Sea 
to reach the Austrian naval base at Pola; and so they 
waited in the Strait of Otranto for the enemy instead of 
in the Strait of Messina, through which the two German 
ships passed to the east on their way to the Dardanelles. 
With flags flying and music playing, the ships left Messina 
and turned eastward. Shortly after, an English cruiser, 
the Gloucester, discovered the German ships moving east- 
ward and attempted to signal the British fleet that the 
Germans were slipping away. The Germans interfered 
with the wireless messages from the Gloucester, which en- 
tirely threw the British fleet off its guard, and safely got 
away. When the British finally realized what had hap- 
pened, they made for the Dardanelles, but the Goehen and 
Breslau were already up the Straits and at Constantinople, 
where they were sold with all their crews to the Turkish 
government. If the British and French had followed them 



258 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

into the Dardanelles, as they had just as much right to 
do as the German ships, they would have been destroyed 
and perhaps Turkey kept out of the war. The episode 
was altogether an unpleasant one for the British Navy. 

Other incidents which led to naval activity on an in- 
teresting scale were the attempts that both British and 
Germans made, the British wholly and immediately suc- 
cessful, and the Germans only temporarily so, to cut each 
other's cables. The day after England declared war, she 
sent the Drake to cut the German cables off the Azores and 
so severed communication between the German ships at 
sea and their Admiralty at home. In the Pacific, the 
Niirnhurg cut the British cable at Fanning Island, sit- 
uated about 400 miles south of Hawaii. This attempt was 
successful. 

An attempt which did not succeed but which resulted 
in one of the most romantic episodes of the war was that 
of the Emden, commanded by the valiant Captain Muller, 
which tried to capture the cable and wireless station in 
Keeling, Cocos Island, in the far east. The Emden did 
not succeed as the wireless operator at the station got in 
touch with British men-of-war, who promptly came to the 
rescue. The Emden had had an exciting career ever since 
the beginning of the war, all up and down the Pacific from 
the China coast to the Indian Ocean, destroying British 
merchantmen and bombarding coast towns. The navies 
of England, Russia, and Japan had hunted for her; and 
yet she had always, by a device of her commander in alter- 
ing and painting the funnels of the ship, managed to 



THE NAVIES IN 1914 259 

escape her pursuers. Her own career came to an end when 
she attempted to destroy the wireless station at KeeHng, 
Cocos Island. Forty-seven officers and men of the ship 
had landed to destroy the station, while the Emden stood 
at the harbor entrance to watch against a surprise attack. 
Here an Australian cruiser, the Sydney, found and de- 
stroyed her. The men who had gone ashore later seized 
a schooner and sailed for the Arabian coast near the Red 
Sea where they landed, and made their way to Turkey and 
so back to Germany. 

The first naval engagement of the war took place in 
Helgoland Bight on August 28th, when some German 
light cruisers were reported coming out into the North 
Sea. Three British submarines were sent to decoy the 
Germans towards advanced units of a fleet under the com- 
mand of Vice Admiral Beatty, which was to engage them. 
The decoy worked perfectly, as several German destroy- 
ers and light cruisers chased the submarines. A fight took 
place between the British cruisers Arethusa and Fearless, 
and a number of destroyers, and four German cruisers, 
the Ariadne, Strashurg, Koln and Mainz, and with Ger- 
man destroyers. To the northwest of this combat Vice 
Admiral Beatty with his flagship, the battle cruiser Lion, 
and the Queen Mary, and the light cruisers, Falmouth and 
Nottingham, were in reserve. The British were hard 
pressed, being attacked by three German submarines. 
Vice Admiral Beatty brought his ships into action and 
turned the scales against the Germans. The British light 
cruiser, Arethusa, was badly damaged and had to be towed 



260 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

back to port, while several of the destroyers were hard hit. 
The Germans lost three light cruisers, the Koln, Mainz 
and Ariadne and one destroyer, V-187, which were sunk. 
Several of the other German cruisers and destroyers were 
badly damaged and limped back to port in a sinking con- 
dition. 

When the war began there was a German squadron in 
the Pacific under the command of Admiral von Spec. 
This squadron consisted of the armored cruisers, Scharn- 
horst and Gneisenau, and the light cruisers, Nilrnhurg and 
Leipzig, The Niirnhurg, as you know, had cut the Brit- 
ish cables at Fanning Island. Later this squadron was 
joined by the light cruiser Dresden which was cruising in 
the south Atlantic waters. A British squadron, under 
command of Admiral Sir Christopher Craddock, composed 
of the cruisers Good Hope and Monmouth, and the light 
cruiser Glasgow and transport Otranto, was cruising in 
the south Atlantic off the coast of Brazil. Admiral Crad- 
dock took his ships around the Horn in search of the Ger- 
man squadron and met it off Coronel on the afternoon of 
the first of November. In weight of tonnage and range 
of guns, the German fleet was superior to the British. 
About six o'clock in the evening of the first of November, 
the battle opened in a heavy sea and a gale of wind at a 
range of about fifteen thousand yards. Another British 
ship, the Canopus, 250 miles to the south was making a 
vain effort to reach the scene of action. This ship would 
have made a valuable addition to Admiral Craddock's 
fleet, but he opened fire upon the enemy without waiting 



THE NAVIES IN 1914 261 

for the Canopus to strengthen his forces. The British 
fleet was defeated. Two of the British ships were sunk, 
the Good Hope on which the Admiral lost his life, and the 
Monmouth. The Glasgow escaped. The Germans came 
through unscratched, two of their crew being wounded. 

This defeat filled England with indignation, for, as 
you may suppose, Germany made the most of this the first 
naval battle of the war. Silently and secretly the British 
admiralty prepared to avenge the defeat of Admiral Crad- 
dock. Within ten days a powerful British squadron under 
Vice Admiral Sturdee was nearing the Falkland Islands, 
a wireless and coaling station off the southeastern coast of 
South America. Admiral von Spee after defeating the 
British rounded Cape Horn and came up the south At- 
lantic with the intention of taking this British station at 
the Falkland Islands. He was unaware of the presence 
of the British fleet, and much elated by his success in the 
Pacific, carelessly ran into the lion's mouth. Admiral 
Sturdee had under his command two battle cruisers, the 
Invincible and Inflexible, three armored cruisers, Carna- 
von, Cornwall, and Kent; two scout cruisers, Bristol and 
Glasgow, and the Canopus, the battleship which had 
failed to reach Admiral Craddock in the battle off Coronel. 
In weight, speed, and gun range, this fleet was far superior 
to the German squadron which was the same that fought 
Admiral Craddock. 

On the morning of December 8th, the British Fleet, 
which was inside of Franklin Harbor, sighted the Germans 
but were themselves hidden. Soon, however, the Germans 



262 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

discovered the British and tried to get away. About ten 
o'clock the British gave chase and caught up with the 
Scliarnliorst and Gneisenau. About noon, the battle 
opened. By nine o'clock, all the German ships but the 
Dresden had been sunk. The Dresden escaped and after a 
three months' career of commerce destroying, was hunted 
down by the Carnavon and Glasgow in March, near the 
Island of Juan de Fernandez, and destroyed. The British 
lost none of their ships, but had nine of their crew killed. 
With this action, all of the German warships on the high 
seas were swept away. 



CHAPTER II 

THE NAVIES IN 1915 

THOUGH the sea from the beginning of the war 
until the end of 1914 was not as crowded with 
events as the land, there was something con- 
stantly doing, and the world was full of expectation that 
a naval battle of the first magnitude would take place. 
In this latter, the world was doomed to be disappointed. 
Nevertheless, the sea was crowded with incidents full of 
interest and surprises. Hereafter, the interest in sea fight- 
ing was steadily to diminish until the battle at Jutland was 
to astonish the world by its immense proportions. Until 
the submarine warfare developed, the world was hardly 
to realize that there was any fighting at sea at all. 
The submarine was to begin a tale of horror of which the 
world knew the details to the last word, but there was an- 
other side to the submarine warfare of which the world 
knew next to nothing, and that was full of romance and 
heroism. Little has been told of this romance except for 
the mere fact that the British submarines had entered the 
Baltic Sea or the Dardanelles. The Baltic and the Dar- 
danelles bring up tragic and pathetic memories of Allied 
efforts, but there was a brighter side to that page, and that 

263 



264 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

was the achievements of the British submarine command- 
ers. That page we will leave until a little later. 

In the meantime, two events of note took place on the 
seas in 1915. In only one of these, however, were the war- 
ships fighting each other and this engagement, the Dogger 
Bank encounter, is notable for the fact that ships with 
big guns were in action for the first time. The other event 
was the contest between sea and land forces before the 
Dardanelles when the gi-eat Anglo-French fleet tried to 
reduce the fortifications on both sides of the Straits and 
thus open a way to an attack on Constantinople. We will 
deal with the fight in the North Sea first which took place 
on January 24, 1915. 

The Germans on this date attempted a second raid on 
the seacoast towns of England. They sent a squadron of 
battle cruisers to carry out this dastardly work. It hap- 
pened that at daybreak on that date. Vice Admiral Beatty 
with five battle cruisers was out patrolling the North Sea 
and encountered the Germans. Beatty's ships were the 
Lion, Princess Royal, Tiger, New Zealand, and Indomi- 
table, accompanied by four light cruisers, while a cruiser 
flotilla and destroyers were flung out in advance of his 
main fleet scouting and screening his forces. It was this 
fleet that discovered the Germans. 

The German Fleet under Admiral von Hipper con- 
sisted of the battle cruisers, Seydlitz, Derfflinger, and 
Moltke, with the armored cruiser Bliicher. In addition, 
these capital ships were accompanied by a fleet of light 
cruisers and destroyers. The destroyers on neither side 



THE NAVIES IN 1915 265 

got into the thick of the fight. It was a running fight, be- 
cause immediately the Germans found they were discov- 
ered, they turned tail and made for home. Shots were 
fired at a range of 20,000 yards and clean hits made at 
18,000 yards. The Bliicher, the slowest of the German 
ships, soon fell astern of her comrades, and passing her, 
the slower British ships New Zealand and hidomitable 
pounded heavy broadsides into her. About noon the 
Bliicher sank, but not before she had done considerable 
damage to Beatty's flagship, the Lion, which was put out 
of action at about eleven o'clock. 

The British pursued the German ships to within 
seventy miles of Helgoland Bight, where the engagement 
was broken off because the British feared the mine fields. 
All through the chase, however, the German ships dropped 
floating mines as they ran away, but this did not stop the 
British. It was only the fear of running into a wide area 
of mines and having their ships blown up that made the 
British stop. 

It was a gallant fight on both sides, in spite of the fact 
that the Germans were running away and the British 
pursuing them. The long range between the ships and the 
accuracy of gun fire of the battle cruisers on both sides 
astonished the world and made this type of warship very 
prominent. 

The Dogger Bank encounter was the first of the two 
North Sea Battles. The second and greater was not to 
take place until nearly a year and a half later. The great 



266 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

ships of the British Grand Fleet were to settle down to 
silent watching and constant patrolling. 

Let us turn now many miles away from the scenes of 
the North Sea to the far end of the Mediterranean where 
a narrow strip of water from the ^gean Sea to the Sea 
of Marmora separates the mainland of Europe from that 
of Asia. This narrow passage, called the Straits of the 
Dardanelles, under international law was closed in time 
of war to the fighting ships of all the nations. We have 
seen how the German ships, Goeben and Breslau, violated 
this international law and escaped to safety in the Golden 
Horn. That illegal act, which had been arranged between 
Germany and Turkey, had been the cause of driving Tur- 
key into the war. It was the purpose now of the Allies 
to send their warships up the Dardanelles for two very 
decided reasons. The first was to take Constantinople 
and force Turkey out of the war, and the second was that 
by so doing, they would open a route to the Russian Black 
Sea ports by which supplies and ammunition could be sent 
to the Russians and their great stores of grain, which the 
Allies needed so badly, could be brought away. To suc- 
ceed in carrying out this very vital purpose, it was neces- 
sary to reduce all the forts on both sides of the Dardanelles 
at the entrance, then steam up the Straits and destroy the 
forts at The Narrows for a clear passage to the Sea of 
Marmora. Admiral Garden, in command of the Anglo- 
French Fleet, believed that this could be accomplished in 
about a month. He had under his command eighteen bat- 
tleships, nine cruisers, and five destroyers in the British 



THE NAVIES IN 1915 267 

Fleet together with the French Fleet of seven battleships 
and three cruisers. Most of these ships were of the pre- 
dreadnought type. England, however, had sent out to 
join the Fleet her newest and most powerful battleship, 
the Queen Elizabeth. 

On February 19th early in the morning, Vice Admiral 
Garden in command of the British Fleet and Rear Ad- 
miral Guepratte, in command of the French Fleet, began 
a bombardment of the forts to the entrance of the Darda- 
nelles on both the European and Asiatic shores. By after- 
noon the forts had been silenced. Bad weather came on 
which compelled the ships to suspend operations for sev- 
eral days. On the 25th, another bombardment of the forts 
took place and this time, having the way cleared by mine 
sweepers, a number of the larger battleships steamed four 
miles up the Straits, and destroyed Fort Dardanos. Again 
bad weather intervened and the operations were held up. 
In the meantime, the Turks had rehabilitated the forts. 
On IMarch 1st the bombardment began again, which con- 
tinued for four days, and with the aid of mine sweepers, the 
battleships reached to within one mile and a half of the 
Narrows. The giant dreadnought, Queen Elizabeth, with 
the battleships Agamemnon and Ocean, were now dis- 
patched to the Gulf of Saros along the European shore on 
the western side of Gallipoli and began a long range, in- 
direct fire, guided by airmen, upon the forts on the Asiatic 
side of The Narrows. A violent bombardment was kept up 
at the same time on the forts on both sides of The Narrows 
by the warships in the Straits. This engagement took 



268 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

place on the 6th and 7th of March, but was not successful. 
After the 7th there was a long lull in the operations until 
the 18th of the month, when a general attack by both the 
British and French ships was concentrated on the forts at 
The Narrows. The ships were greeted with a heavy fire 
from the forts. Nearly all of them were hit and had to re- 
treat. More ships came up to take their places and kept up 
a constant fire upon the forts. The mine sweepers were 
steadily at work trying to open a passage for the battle- 
ships to pass through into the Sea of Marmora. The day 
of the 18th of March was a critical time in the operations 
upon the forts on both sides of The Narrows. Floating 
mines came drifting down on the current and sank the 
French ship, Bouvet, and the British ships. Irresistible and 
Ocean. The French ship, Gaulois, and the British ship. 
Inflexible, were also severely damaged by gun fire from 
the forts. German submarines brought overland in parts 
and assembled at Constantinople now came down to the 
Straits to help in the defense. It was found impossible 
by Admiral de Robeck, who had succeeded Admiral Car- 
den in command of the Anglo-French Fleet, to destroy 
the forts by naval attack, and it was given up. 



CHAPTER III 

THE NAVIES IN 1916 AND 1917 

THE year 1916 will ever be memorable for the 
biggest naval battle in the history of the world. 
Except for the constant and laborious work of 
the small craft in the North Sea, through the English 
Channel, in the Mediterranean and Adriatic Seas, only 
one event stands out in the naval history of the year. That 
event was the Battle of Jutland, when the British Grand 
Fleet and the German High Seas Fleet were locked in 
deadly combat. It would seem as if not only all the years 
of this great world war, but all the years of a century were 
crowded into this supreme test of naval power between 
England and Germany. It was "Der Tag," The Day 
which for nearly half a century the Germans had boasted 
about and looked forward to with pompous vanity. It was 
a challenge for which Great Britain waited calmly, con- 
fidently, and in every way prepared. For nearly two 
years, the British Fleet stood and waited with its eyes ever 
upon the German coast for the welcome sign that at last 
the Germans would come out and fight. All that time the 
Germans had been watching too, watching for an oppor- 
tunity to catch the British Grand Fleet separated so that 
they might overwhelm part of it with a superior force. 

269 



270 THE STORY. OF THE GREAT WAR 

This would so reduce the strength of the British Fleet as 
to compel it to fight on even terms with the Germans ; but 
the British were not to be caught napping. That mighty 
armada, the Grand Fleet, under the command of Admiral 
Jellicoe, was created in August, 1914, for two purposes 
only. One was to supply the iron rim in the blockade 
against the German coast, and the other was to fight the 
German High Seas Fleet should it ever come out into the 
North Sea. Therefore it was never separated and there 
was never a minute during the nearly two years of patient 
waiting when the British Fleet was not ready at a second's 
notice to fight. Day and night the boilers in the ships of 
the great fleet were kept going so that within a minute's 
notice pressure could be forced to the utmost, and the 
ships on their way to the scene of action. In every other 
respect the great Fleet was ready, the officers and crews 
knowing how, and ready, to the very least detail to do their 
duties. So on the afternoon of May 31, 1916, the Ger- 
mans were discovered well up into the North Sea off Jut- 
land on the Danish coast. Now let us see how the forces 
were opposed. 

Vice Admiral Beatty was in command of the advance 
force of the British Fleet, consisting of six battle cruisers, 
supported by Rear Admiral Evan Thomas with four 
battleships of the Queen Elizabeth class. The main body 
of the Fleet under the supreme command of Admiral 
Jellicoe, who flew his flag on the Iron Duke, consisted of 
twenty-five dreadnoughts in three squadrons, commanded 
by Rear Admiral Arbuthnot and Vice Admirals Burney, 



THE NAVIES IN 1916 AND 1917 271 

Perram, and Stiirdee, with a squadron of three fast 
cruisers under the command of Admiral Hood. About 
twenty hght cruisers and 160 destroyers were divided be- 
tween the advance force of Admiral Beatty and the main 
force of Admiral Jellicoe. Now on the German side was 
an advance force of five battle cruisers under Vice Ad- 
miral von Hipper. The main body of the German Fleet 
consisted of sixteen dreadnoughts, and six pre-dread- 
nought battleships. About 20 light cruisers and 90 de- 
stroyers were divided between the advance force and the 
main body of the German Fleet, which was under the su- 
preme command of Admiral von Sheer. 

Now the battle was divided into four stages. Admiral 
Beatty with the British advance force met Admiral von 
Hipper with the German advance force, and became en- 
gaged in parallel courses curving to the southeast at a 
range of 18,500 yards. The battle went on furiously for 
over an hour and drew in the light cruisers and destroyers 
on both sides who fought a savage battle at close range. 
In this first phase of the battle, the English suffered severe 
losses, losing two of their battleships, the Indefatigable 
and Queen Mary, besides four destroyers. Now at this 
stage of the battle, it is said that the British Admiral, 
Beatty, played into the hands of the Germans by rashly 
exposing his squadron through impetuosity. On the other 
hand, it is said that Beatty's purpose was to hold the Ger- 
man advance force and draw on the main force of Ger- 
man dreadnoughts, and then lead them into the direction 
of Admiral Jellicoe's main force of the Grand Fleet, which 



272 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

he knew to be speeding to the scene of action from the 
north. In doing this, Beatty tried to maneuver his squad- 
ron to the southward of von Hipper's squadron, which he 
successfully did, at the same time signaling Admiral 
Thomas to close in on the Germans with his support, the 
Fifth Battle Squadron. In doing this. Admiral Thomas's 
ships fell into battle astern of Beatty's battle cruisers, and 
came under the fire of the main German High Seas Fleet 
which at this time came upon the scene of action. Admiral 
Beatty now had the satisfaction of sighting the leading 
ships of Admiral Jellicoe's main fleet bearing down with 
great speed from the north to take part in the battle. When 
it was still five miles away, Beatty turned his squadron due 
east, and thus opened a great gap between his ships and 
Admiral Thomas's supporting squadron of battleships. So 
before Admiral Jellicoe with his great fleet of dread- 
noughts got into the battle. Admiral Beatty's squadrons 
with the support of Admiral Thomas's battleships were 
fighting the entire German High Seas Fleet. 

Admiral Beatty has been criticized for his rashness, 
but he was, at least, living up to the daring traditions of 
the British Navy. It seems that he had one very great 
purpose in mind which justified his fighting against such 
great odds, and that was to hold the entire German High 
Seas Fleet in action until Admiral Jellicoe brought his 
great mass of dreadnoughts into the attack, then get to the 
south of the German Fleet and prevent its escape while 
Admiral Jellicoe's ships destroyed them. Thus the second 
phase of the Battle of Jutland ends and the third phase 



THE NAVIES IN 1916 AND 1917 273 

begins with the British Grand Fleet opening fire upon the 
main body of the German High Seas Fleet. 

Rear Admiral Hood with three battle cruisers and a 
screen of light cruisers and destroj^ers, forming the ad- 
vanced swift wing of Admiral Jellicoe's main force, went 
into action a little after 6 o'clock. Admiral Hood's flag- 
ship, the Invincible, was sunk by gun fire and the gallant 
Admiral went down with his ship. Admiral Jellicoe's bat- 
tle fleet now steamed into the gap we have mentioned that 
was opened between Admiral Beatty's battle cruisers and 
Admiral Thomas's support battle squadron, formed into 
battle line and opened fire upon the German High Seas 
Fleet. At this time, and how strange it seems, both on 
land and sea the natural elements intervened to favor the 
Germans. A low mist rose from the water with which 
was mingled the thick drifting smoke from the guns, and 
which hid many of the enemy's ships. This is the "low 
visibility" of which you have heard so much said in con- 
nection with the Battle of Jutland. Only a few ships in 
the enemy's battle line could be seen at a time, and the 
engagement was broken into fragments, instead of being 
one inclusive and continuous battle. The battle between 
the British Grand Fleet and the German High Seas Fleet 
lasted for over two hours, with the British Fleet between 
the German Fleet and its bases, but under the "low visibil- 
ity" and the cover of the approaching night the German 
Fleet eluded the British and got away. It has been asked 
why did not Admiral Jelhcoe, with the advantage he had 
in position, destroy the German Fleet by a vigorous all 



274 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

night action. It was not fear of the German battleships 
that prevented him from pursuing the German Fleet 
southward during the night. He feared the mines and 
submarines which, unseen in the dark waters, would sink 
his ships. Thus it was caution which made the British Ad- 
miral permit a decisive victory to slip through his fingers. 
He had proven in a ship to ship fight the superiority of the 
British Fleet which still assured it control of the sea, and 
that meant the safety of England. But if his great dread- 
noughts had been measurably reduced by mines and sub- 
marines without equal losses to the German Fleet, their 
next challenge would have a promise of success, and any 
decisive success against the main body of British sea power 
meant the downfall of England. 

In the early dawn of June 1st, Admiral Jellicoe's Fleet 
with Admiral Beatty's on his right slightly ahead, was 
ninety miles to the south of the battlefield. The German 
Fleet could not have been very far ahead, but they were 
effectually hidden by the "low visibility." This undoubt- 
edly enabled them to return to their bases while the British 
Fleet turned again northward. The battle was over. In 
spite of the heavy losses sustained by the British, the Union 
Jack was still supreme upon the seas. 

But the cowardly submarine warfare carried on by the 
Germans became more formidable. Early in 1917 the 
German Government announced unrestricted submarine 
warfare in specified zones about the British Isles. 

In 1917 the Germans sank so many ships that the very 
existence of Great Britian was threatened. The losses ap- 



THE NAVIES IN 1916 AND 1917 275 

proached the appalling figure of a million tons a month — 
losses that if sustained for any length of time would bring 
a quick end to the war in favor of Germany. President 
Wilson asked Congress that an armed guard be placed 
upon all American merchant vessels. It was plain that 
the German submarine operations would soon bring the 
United States into the war. 

Late in March, 1917, the American Admiral, William 
S. Sims was sent by Washington to Great Britian, where 
he learned that the true facts regarding submarine war- 
fare had not been given to the British public and that Ger- 
many was actually winning the war through her sub- 
marine operations. Admiral Sims promptly made 
these facts known to Washington and after the declara- 
tion of war by the United States prevailed upon his coun- 
try to send at once all possible craft that could be used 
against the submarine to co-operate with the British Navy. 
Heroic efforts were made to check the submarine terror. 
New mine fields were laid, systems of convoying vessels 
were planned with great success and new weapons were 
brought into play against the submarine, notably the depth 
bomb. Destroyers, the most effective vessels against sub- 
marines, were constructed as fast as possible. 

Helpless against the British Grand Fleet the German 
naval authorities turned their attentions against the Rus- 
sians. But on August 10th the Russians defeated a Ger- 
man squadron of nine battleships, twelve cruisers and many 
destroyers that attempted to enter the Gulf of Riga and 
the Germans were compelled to leave the gulf. On 



276 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

October 17th, however, the Russians were defeated there in 
another naval engagement. The Russian battleship Slava, 
13,516 tons, was sunk, and several other and smaller 
vessels. 



CHAPTER IV 

THE NAVIES IN 1918 

WE now come to the most heroic episode per- 
formed by the British navy during the war. 
When the Germans overran Belgium, they 
turned Zeebrugge and Ostend into submarine bases. They 
were connected with Bruges by canals, to which place the 
Germans brought their submarines in parts, assembled 
them together, and drove them out to sea from Zeebrugge 
and Ostend. These two Flemish ports had no natural 
harbors; but by skillful engineering, the Germans fitted 
them to their purpose. All during 1915, 1916 and 1917, 
these pirates, the submarines, went out to sea unmolested 
and destroyed the Allied and neutral shipping and sunk 
passenger ships without mercy. If the Allies could de- 
stroy the submarine bases in Flanders, they could check 
this dangerous undersea warfare, because then the Ger- 
mans would have to send the submarines from the Baltic 
which was much more difficult and at a greater distance 
from the open sea and the Hmited radius of action of the 
submarines would put a limit to their operations. Time 
and again the British sent airplanes to bomb the submarine 
bases at Zeebrugge and Ostend; but the great height from 
which it was necessary to drop bombs to avoid the anti- 

277 



278 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

aircraft guns, made the targets uncertain. Considerable 
destruction, of course, was done from these airplane raids ; 
but the Germans were always able speedily to repair what 
damage was done, which had little or no effect upon the 
work of the submarines. Matters became so bad that it 
was necessary to do something drastic to kill the submarine 
warfare at its source. Many devices were used to destroy 
the submarines at sea. This was very slow work and en- 
tailed a great deal of labor as well as danger; but if the 
bases, the ports where the submarines were fitted out, that 
is, supplied with fuel and torpedoes and repaired, were 
destroyed, then much of the danger from this unlawful 
sea fighting would be ended. Hence the British planned 
to destroy the two most important submarine bases in 
Belgium. 

The episode I am about to describe was one of the most 
heroic in the annals of the British navy. The high spirit 
in which the officers and men entered into this extremely 
dangerous task was magnificent. The chances of certain 
death to all the men who were engaged in it were such 
that the British Admiralty did not think that it ought to 
command the men to undertake it; so volunteer crews 
were made up, that is, the seamen of the British navy were 
given to understand that a very dangerous mission was to 
be undertaken and that the men could have their choice 
as to whether they would take part in it or not. Of course, 
they did not know what the nature of the task was or 
where it was to be performed. Great secrecy had to be 
kept to keep the attack from leaking through and reach- 



1 



THE NAVIES IN 1918 279 

ing the enemy; and so it is interesting to know that the 
number of crews that were needed was made up many 
times over by the volunteers, so eager were the men to 
take part in a dangerous exploit for the glory of Great 
Britain. 

It was on Saint George's Day, the 23rd of April, 1918, 
that the assault on the German bases took place. Saint 
George, as you know, is the patron saint of England, and 
so the day was auspicious for the undertaking of a task so 
vital to the protection of the English people. The opera- 
tion was conducted by forces that made up a part of the 
Dover Patrol, that portion of the British navy which had 
its base at Dover and had to keep safe the entrance to the 
British Channel. Rear Admiral Roger Keyes was in su- 
preme command of the attack. 

Early in the morning of April 23rd, the light cruiser. 
Vindictive, with two ferry boats, the Iris and Daffodih 
which had been used in ferrying across the Mersey at 
Wallasey; three concrete laden ships, the Thetis, Intrepid, 
and Iphigenia, for Zeebrugge; the two concrete laden 
ships, the Sirius and Brilliant, for Ostend; and the de- 
stroyers. North Star, Phoebe, and Warwick, on which Ad- 
miral Keyes directed the operations; and a number of 
motor launches steamed in the darkness behind a heavy 
smoke screen to Zeebrugge and Ostend. Their object was 
to sink the five concrete laden ships in the two narrow 
channels at these two bases and choke the passage through 
which the submarines put out to sea. The attempt at 
Zeebrugge was the larger and more dangerous operation ; 



280 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

and here the attempt was wholly successful, while at 
Ostend it was only partially so. 

At Zeebrugge was a long mole or concrete pier con- 
nected with the shore by a wooden trestle or viaduct a 
quarter of a mile long, heavily fortified with guns. It 
was the Vindictive' s duty to run alongside of this mole and 
land a storming party to prevent the Germans from turn- 
ing their guns on the concrete laden ships which were to 
be sunk in the channel. In the meantime, the submarine 
laden with high explosives was to be run under the trestle 
work that connected the mole with the shore and be blown 
up, tearing it apart, preventing reenforcements from 
reaching the mole to attack the storming party that had 
landed from the Vindictive. 

As the Vindictive neared the mole behind the thick 
screen of smoke, Admiral Keyes on the destroyer, War- 
wick, signaled for the attack to begin, using the words, 
*' Saint George for England," and the Vindictive flashed 
back the reply, "May we give the dragon's tail a damn 
good twist." The Vindictive was supplied with a high 
false bridge from which the storming party was to cross 
from the ship to the mole. But when the Vindictive ap- 
proached the mole, the wind shifted throwing back the 
smoke screen and laying her bare to the Germans. Im- 
mediately they sent up a star shell which was followed by 
a great flash of searchlights that settled on the Vindictive; 
and at once the batteries and machine guns along the mole 
poured a deluge of shells and bullets upon the ships. When 
this happened, the Vindictive was three hundi'ed yards 



THE NAVIES IN 1918 281 

from the mole; but Commander Carpenter with superb 
skill brought his ship alongside in a few minutes and soon 
eighteen gangways were thrown out. With the words, 
"Over you go, Royals," the storming party of three or 
four hundred men landed and fought like demons against 
the defenders. 

About fifteen minutes after the Vindictive had taken 
her place alongside of the mole at which she was held, 
bow and stern, by the ferry boats which had accompanied 
her, a terrific explosion was heard at the rear end of the 
mole. The submarine had exploded and blown up the 
trestle, cutting off the reenforcements. Now the three 
concrete laden ships, the Thetis, Intrepid, and Ipkigenia, 
firing terrific broadsides and receiving a rain of shells from 
the shore batteries, accompanied by motor launches which 
were to take off their crews, steamed into the Channel, and 
blew up and sunk. 

The great deed was now accomplished. The Vindictive 
blew twelve sirens and signaled many times to recall the 
storming party on the mole. Commander Carpenter 
waited until he was convinced that all the men had re- 
turned before he gave the command to withdraw. The 
Vindictive under a curtain of smoke drew away from the 
mole and with the other ships made for the sea. A perfect 
torrent of shells from German batteries bade them good- 
by. The destroyer. North Star, losing her way in the 
dense smoke emerged into the glare of the enemy's search- 
lights and hit many times by his shells, was soon sunk. 
The other ships got away safely, but the Vindictive had 



282 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

been hit many times as she stood along the mole and all 
her upper structure was severely battered. The brave 
old ship when she returned to Dover was badly wounded 
after her dangerous exploit, but was sound and the most 
admired ship in the British navy. 

At Ostend, the operation under the command of Com- 
modore Hubert Lynes was not nearly so successful. Here 
it was not necessary to land a storming party. The diffi- 
culty was in finding the entrance to the Channel; and in 
the dense darkness, motor boats had to light great flares 
to guide the concrete laden ships into the Channel. These 
flares were snuffed out time and time again by the Ger- 
man batteries ; but finally, the motor boats dropped flares, 
which were great torches thrown upon the water, which 
burned long enough to guide the ships in. But the two 
concrete laden ships, the Brilliant and Sirius, were hit 
many times by the shore batteries and were in a sinking 
condition when taken into the Channel and blown up. The 
positions, however, in which they were sunk did not ef- 
fectually block the Channel. It remained for the Vindic- 
tive to complete the attempt that was made on Saint 
George's Day nearly two weeks later. At two o'clock on 
the morning of ]May 10th, the Vindictive under a hurri- 
cane of shells from the shore batteries was herself sunk 
across the Channel at Ostend, — and so ended the life of 
this noble ship. 

The results of the assaults on the submarine bases at 
Zeebrugge and Ostend were immediate. The Channel at 
Zeebrugge was wholly blocked; that at Ostend partially 



THE NAVIES IN 1918 283 

so, and from this time, the submarine warfare of the Ger- 
mans began to cease. The Germans had been hit a mighty- 
blow at the source of their crudest and most effective 
strength against the Alhes. The dragon's tail had indeed 
been twisted, and twisted so badly that he crawled into his 
lair wounded unto death. 



PART V 
MARVELS OF ACHIEVEMENTS 



CHAPTER I 

HOW MEN TOOK WINGS AND FOUGHT 

NOW as in the past, the armies in the field have 
been the center of attraction to all the world. 
Where did the soldiers fight, how many were 
engaged, who won the battle, how many prisoners and 
guns were captured? This is what the world has wanted 
to know. In olden times, the winning of battles was 
largely determined by three or four things : the genius of 
the commanding general, the superior number of men on 
one side or the other, or the advantage of position. Of 
course, the feeding and ammunitioning of the troops had 
its influence on the outcome of the battle; but in modern 
warfare, and in such a war as the World War, there had 
entered other elements into the whole scheme of battle 
which changed its character, and had a tremendous effect 
up9n the results. These elements, while they have at- 
tracted a great deal of attention, are, after all, in the gen- 
eral mind apart from the main interest of the battle itself. 
The main interest consists of killing a greater number of 
the enemy and of taking a large part of the territory in 
his possession. Now the recent war was not many months 
old, when it was proved that these essential purposes of 
the fighting could not be accomplished without the help 

287 



288 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

of a new machine, which for the first time came into use 
in battle. This was the airplane. Some ten or fifteen 
years before the war broke out, and after many years of 
experiment, two Americans, the Wright brothers, through 
their invention of a heavier-than-air machine, gave to 
mankind the power of wings. What these two men ac- 
complished was the fact that man could fly, but that ac- 
complishment did not pass much beyond a fact when the 
war began. But it was enough that man had wings. 

Now when the war started and the Germans sent their 
troops into Belgium, they also sent aviators flying over 
the troops gathering information of the country over which 
they marched, which was of great value. The Germans 
flew in a machine called the Taube, which means dove. 
They had the only flying machine that was used for mili- 
tary purposes, and they alone were making use of this 
new achievement for warfare. It was not long, however, 
before France, who was the first to see the necessity of off- 
setting this advantage, began to build airplanes for mili- 
tary use. The first German airplanes were merely used 
for scouting, though the aviators were equipped with 
pistols and rifles. The early French machines were also 
for scouting, but the French went one step further and 
mounted machine-guns. Then the British came along and 
built heavy machines for combat ; indeed, the real air fight- 
ing began when the British began to develop the airplane 
for fighting purposes, and a subsequent change in military 
aviation took place. 

The airplane was first the "eye of the army." And as 





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HOW MEN TOOK WINGS 289 

the eye it developed many uses. From watching and re- 
porting the enemy's movements, it began discovering the 
positions of the enemy's batteries and trenches and making 
photographs of them. Their exact locations being fixed by 
the camera the guns would begin to shell them. The guns 
being many miles away from the target at which they shot, 
of course they could not be seen. When the shells fell 
the aviator high up in the air in his machine would watch 
the effect of the shots, and when they went wide of the 
mark he would send messages by wireless or other means 
back to the batteries correcting the range. Thus the air- 
plane rendered an invaluable service that nothing else 
could have done. 

There were four distinct types of airplanes needed for 
military purposes. There were the scouting machines such 
as the German Taube, the French Bleriots or the Sop- 
with ; the artillery-spotters which had many of the charac- 
teristics of the scouting machines; the battling airplanes 
like the German Fokkers; and the great bombing ma- 
chines, the giants of the sky, like the German Gotha, the 
British Handley-Page and the Italian Caproni. 

Often these different types of machines worked in 
squadrons in regular battle formation in the sky. The 
battle-planes were the smallest and lightest of all, and the 
speediest, usually with one man aboard. A machine-gun 
was over the blades of the propeller. The aim of the ma- 
chine-gun was in the direction of the airplane and an ar- 
rangement was made by which an instrument on the 
propeller-shaft worked the trigger of the machine-gun so 



290 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

that the bullets would fly to their mark between the revolu- 
tions of the propeller. The mechanism was so arranged 
for a shot to be fired at every two revolutions of the pro- 
peller, as the machine-gun would fire about five hundred 
rounds a minute while the propeller would revolve about 
twelve hundred times a minute. 

The aviators often fought among the clouds twenty 
thousand feet in the air. Their speed reached as high as 
150 miles an hour. 

The giants of the sky, the bombing planes, were used 
for attacking important military positions and bases. 
Ammunition dumps, troops-trains, railway stations, sub- 
marine bases, and munition factories were the principal 
targets for the Allied airmen. The Germans thought it 
was of some mihtary importance to use their machines to 
bomb open towns, that is unfortified cities, and kill help- 
less old men and women and innocent children. These 
bombing planes were always accompanied by battle-planes 
to keep off the enemy's battle-plane which sought to at- 
tack and destroy the bombers. The largest of the bomb- 
ing planes, the Caproni, carried a crew of three men, 2,750 
pounds of explosives, and was driven by three engines with 
a total of 900 horse-power. 

In perfecting the military uses of the airplane many 
remarkable things were invented and adapted which not 
only made it do its work in the air well but kept it in close 
touch with the earth. This seems very wonderful, but the 
most important part of the airmen's work was to keep the 
command in the field informed of what was going on miles 



HOW MEN TOOK WINGS 291 

behind the enemy's lines, and as time was a vital factor it 
was necessary to report the information quickly. And so 
the airmen were able to talk from the clouds as well as 
send wireless messages. 

I have spoken chiefly of airplanes as a new factor in 
warfare. But what of the men who flew in them, who 
fought high in the clouds and who went on long journeys 
in the night to bomb and destroy the enemy's military posi- 
tions? The Great War on the ground was full of heroism 
but there was little romance about it. Science and ma- 
chinery had robbed war of all the romance that it had 
known in the past. Military aviation was scientific too, 
and not only so in itself, but it made war on the ground 
more scientific because the armies had to protect them- 
selves from its all-seeing eye. The feats of the air-fighting, 
however, gave to the Great War its only touch of romance. 
This was because aerial warfare was one of personal en- 
counters. High above the earth with nothing more stable 
than the air, bufl'eted by strong currents of winds, hid 
from both earth and sky by great masses of clouds, brave 
and daring men fought each other. Not since the Homeric 
heroes of the Iliad have there been any warriors like these 
modern fighters in the air. 

They were men selected for their steady nerves and 
cool brains. Men who did not fear death, who, indeed, 
every time they went up into the air courted it. Their re- 
sponsibilities were immense because the safety and success 
of whole armies depended upon their courage and skill. 
They were compelled to fight the elements as well as man. 



292 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

The jaws of death were always about them ready at the 
least mishap to close and swallow them. The romance of 
the combats they fought was in escaping from those jaws 
as they were about to close. Again and again the airman 
would escape, winning victory after victory against man 
and nature, until, daring once too often, something would 
fail him. It was not courage nor skill, which nerved the 
aviator to the last, but some bit of mechanism, some 
trickery of nature or of the enemy that brought the end. 

Between the airmen of both sides in the war there was 
a chivalry that existed in no other branch of service among 
the belhgerents. This is accounted for in the fact that 
men of the most gentlemanly characters took to aviation 
and they appreciated fully the dangers of flying. 

Captain Boelke was the most famous of the German 
flyers. He would hide in the clouds awaiting an enemy 
upon whom he would descend and attack with a rain of 
machine-gun bullets as soon as he came within range. The 
unsuspecting enemy would be sent crashing to the earth. 
If he missed his prey the speed of his machine would carry 
him past the enemy to safety. He would not return to 
the attack. Count von Richthofen was another famous 
German aviator and was the inventor of the "flying circus." 

Among the British aviators Captain Bishop, the Ca- 
nadian, was greatly celebrated for his deeds. France had 
many daring and intrepid airmen, perhaps more "Aces," 
that is, those who were officially credited with five enemy 
planes, than any of the Allied nations. 

Among the most celebrated of these was George S. 




HOW MEN TOOK WINGS 293 

Guynemer, the "gallant flying boy." He was the com- 
mander of "The Storks," the most famous of all the "flying 
squadrons." He was a very eagle of the air. Although 
possessing a frail body he had a fiery and indomitable mind, 
and became the greatest airman of the war. After a greater 
number of more daring victories than any other aviator, 
he was killed. How, it was never known, only he was not 
seen after he began his last flight. It is supposed that his 
machine was set afire and he perished, his ashes blown by 
the four winds about the skies where he took so many 
risks and achieved such glory. 

Next to Guynemer, Lieutenant Rene Fonck was the 
most famous of French airmen. In his first fight he brought 
down three German machines in a battle which only lasted 
a minute and a half. His great feat was six German ma- 
chines destroyed in three combats that altogether lasted 
less than two hours. At the end of the war he was 
credited with seventy-five official victories. Forty more 
German machines are said to have been destroyed by him. 

Both the Italians and Russians had brilliant aviators. 
Gabrielle D'Annunzio, the Italian poet and novelist, is the 
most famous of the Italians for his spectacular flights over 
the Austrian lines. He performed valiant service flying 
among his own countrymen, exhorting them to greater 
sacrifices to win the war. D'Annunzio's career as an aviator 
is remarkable because of his age, which was far beyond 
the limit of most men fitted for the service. But his 
spirit and courage, strengthened and fired by a patriotism 
that was almost fanatic in its zeal, more than made up for 



294 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

the youth that he had lost when he began to fly. Lieu- 
tenant Commander Prokofieff-Seversky was among the 
most noted of Russian aviators. 

The Americans made daring aviators. Long before 
America had entered the war many of her young men were 
flying for France. Among the pioneers were Norman 
Prince, William Thaw, Eliot Cowdin and Raoul Lufbery. 
They, with many others, belonged to the Lafayette Esca- 
drille, which was formed by William Thaw. Edv/ard 
Rickenbacker was the most daring of the American fl^^ers, 
performing innumerable feats in battling the Germans 
and escaping death time and again by the narrowest mar- 
gin. He came through the war safely. Three young avia- 
tors who lost their lives may be cited as typical examples 
of the very flower of American youth who braved the perils 
of the air for the great cause of civilization. These gallant 
young lads, Quentin Roosevelt, son of the late ex-Presi- 
dent Roosevelt, who was killed in an aerial battle near 
Chateau-Thierry on July 17, 1918; Jack Wright, the 
"Poet of the Air," who was killed in an accident just after 
winning his commission in January, 1918; and Samuel P. 
Mandell, 2d, who was killed on a bombing expedition on 
November 5, 1918, just a few days before the armistice 
was signed, have won an everlasting place in the memory 
of their countrymen. 

The achievements of America in the air were notable 
in spite of the fact that we were so late starting. From 
the middle of September, 1918, to the end of the war two 
months later there were 740 American planes in active 



HOW MEN TOOK WINGS 295 

service with 74!4 pilots and 453 observers. The official 
record of the American aviators was 473 German ma- 
chines destroyed, of which only 120 were unconfirmed. 
The conquest of the air was an American achievement, and 
the American aviators in the war showed an untiring 
energy and fearless spirit in keeping with its tradition of 
conquest. 



CHAPTER II 

HOW THE DOCTORS FOUGHT AND WON VICTORIES 

THERE was an army of soldiers whose names you 
never heard mentioned in the dispatches from 
the front. These soldiers fought day and night 
unwearyingly and unceasingly. And they fought an enemy 
more powerful than those who fought in the trenches. For 
this enemy was absolutely invisible, and his presence was 
known by the horror and suffering he left among the liv- 
ing. He was only merciful when wholly triumphant, be- 
cause then he brought utter peace and escape from pain in 
the eternal sleep that knows no mortal waking. This 
enemy was Death and he fought Life in the Great War 
with two cruel weapons, Wounds and Disease. Against 
these battled the silent army of which I spoke, the doctors, 
who for over four long, terrible years struggled to destroy 
Death's two weapons so that life might be preserved and 
mankind saved from destruction. 

How often have you heard it said that the great fight 
for civilization, because it was fought so scientifically and 
mechanically, had robbed war of its romance and magic. 
I have tried to make you understand that the aviators 
kept romance alive, and now I want you also to under- 
stand that magic was kept ahve by the doctors. The 

296 



HOW THE DOCTORS FOUGHT 297 

aviators were the modern knights of the war, and the doc- 
tors were the modern wizards of the war. 

The combat of the doctors was not Hke that of the com- 
batants in the trenches, man against man, nor was the 
prize to be gained hke so many miles of territory. They 
fought, as I have said, against an invisible foe, and the 
prize they contended for was life itself. It was a far more 
deadly struggle than you can imagine. And the doctors 
won! Can you beheve that? It is true for two reasons. 
In the first place, the doctors taught mankind how to save 
more lives than war can destroy; not only the lives that 
war itself did or may destroy, but the lives that Peace is 
every day destroying in a hundred ways. And in the 
second place, they did this by learning more about their 
science and by successfully practicing what they learned 
in the four years of the war than had been learned by the 
profession in the previous half century. When you con- 
sider the conditions under which this great progress was 
made you must admit that the doctors were wizards, and 
that the word has taken on a nobler meaning which in- 
spires our reverence. 

In medicine and surgery veritable wonders were per- 
formed. America contributed more to the advancement 
of surgery than any other nation. The Americans, it 
seemed, had a genius for surgery. Battered and broken 
soldiers suffering intensely were brought from the pitiless 
exposure of No Man's Land, put into their sensitive but 
energetic hands and had their bodies mended. The Amer- 
ican doctors went to France and worked among the French 



298 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

and British soldiers long before we entered the war. Not 
only to France, but they carried out their merciful minis- 
trations in Serbia, Russia, and in the east; in fact, wher- 
ever the fire and steel of war had inflicted torture upon 
human flesh. Not only among the soldiers did they per- 
form their noble duties but among the civilian populations 
of all the Allied countries where starvation and disease 
raged. There is no nobler page in the history of war 
or peace than that page which chronicles the patient and 
dangerous work of our doctors and nurses in stamping 
out the typhus epidemic that raged throughout Serbia 
after the German conquest in 1915 and 1916. 

And as to the nurses who with such devotion and sacri- 
fice assisted the doctors in their work, — what shall be said 
of these "angels" as the wounded and dying men knew 
them to be? There are no words tender as they were 
tender, patient as they were patient, brave as they were 
brave, or as strong in meaning as they were in spirit, to 
describe and praise them. The memory of thousands and 
thousands of soldiers will in the years to come have one 
everlasting and imperishable vision of Heaven which came 
to them in the presence of the nurse whose voice and hands 
helped to heal body and mind of the scars of battle. 

To understand what the doctors had to overcome it 
may be well to emphasize the problems which the battle- 
fields presented. It is quite obvious that wounds and dis- 
ease formed the whole problem. But doctors in times of 
prolonged peace have always had these to treat and over- 
come. No, it was not these in themselves that made 



HOW THE DOCTORS FOUGHT 299 

the problem of treatment so great. It was the magnitude 
of the wounds on the one hand and the rapid spread of 
disease on the other. There were poor human bodies so 
shattered that it was hard to believe that any skill could 
patch and heal the fragments. Yet they were patched and 
healed. The success of treating the wounds of soldiers 
depended upon curing the raw flesh of infection. In peace- 
time the surgeon always took the utmost precaution dur- 
ing an operation in protecting the patient from germs. 
In the shelter and protection of the modern home or hos- 
pital to do so was a watchful and vital task. But in war 
when the soldier might lie for hours in the trench or field 
with bits of lead or steel in his flesh and the wound cov- 
ered with germ-laden dirt, the danger of infection was a 
thousand-fold greater. Thus one of the first obstacles the 
doctors had to overcome was infection. This was of the 
first importance because operations could not be success- 
fully attempted unless this danger was disposed of. Sol- 
diers had to be relieved of pain, not merely in the per- 
forming of operations which were mastered long before 
the war through the administering of anesthetics, but in 
the removing and putting on of bandages and the dressing 
of wounds v/hile the patient was conscious. For this pur- 
pose a young American, Gordon Young, discovered a 
wonderful anesthetic for spraying wounds and burns which 
relieved the patient's agony. Another important, indeed 
very vital, problem was the development of military or- 
thopedics, that is, the prevention of deformity. Experts 
in this branch of surgery worked close to the firing line 



300 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

and all the way back to the base orthopedic hospital, ren- 
dering immediate and constant aid to the broken limbs and 
ruptured muscles of the soldiers so that the mending and 
healing of them would prevent deformity. 

It would only be possible to suggest some of the mar- 
vels achieved by the medical profession in overcoming some 
of these problems and so cheating misery and death of 
their many victims in war. 

A great English medical authority, Sir Almroth 
Wright, said that the method discovered by Dr. Carrel and 
Dr. Dakin for treating infected wounds was the most val- 
uable contribution to "surgical technique" made in the war. 
The treatment is made by regularly irrigating, that is, to 
wet or moisten the wound with a fluid. This fluid was a 
non-caustic hypochlorite, that is, a salt substance, which 
Drs. Carrel and Dakin originated. The method of ap- 
plying the fluid was quite as important as the fluid itself 
in curing infections. This discovery is one of the great- 
est benefits to humanity that the world has lately received, 
and everywhere doctors are learning the use of it to save 
human life. 

Another marvelous discovery brought about by the war 
was the method and use of chlorination. This was the use 
of some combination of chlorine gas in destroying malig- 
nant germs which create pus in the system. The X-ray 
has been developed to discover the gas bacillus which 
causes gangrene, that is, the decomposition of the tissues 
that result in poisoning the body. Many serums, that is, 
animal fluids such as blood, milk and so forth, taken from 



HOW THE DOCTORS FOUGHT 301 

the body, have been discovered for the prevention and cure 
for such diseases as lockjaw, meningitis, pneumonia and 
fevers. 

The new surgery developed by the war was not merely 
content in saving life, but it worked successfully to repair 
the damages done by fire and steel to the human body, 
and to restore the limbs and features of the body so that 
they could perform their normal functions. Artificial 
hands, feet and legs have for a long time been manufac- 
tured to replace these useful members of the human body, 
but never before with such perfection. The war-time sur- 
geon has mastered the anatomy of the human body as a 
mechanic masters his machine. He learned to a nicety 
how to repair it so that it would be difficult to say where 
it had been broken. He learned to make a man whole 
again and so make him useful as a citizen. Perhaps the 
most wonderful and magical of this kind of achievement 
in surgery was accomplished at a hospital in Milan, Italy, 
where artificial jaws, palates, bones, ears and noses were 
made and fitted and made to work so that the person was 
scarcely aware of the loss of these members which nature 
had given him. Our own American doctors have taken 
the battered face of a man and given him a new one and 
with a natural skin which would deceive almost any one. 

Yes, the doctors fought not against man, but with suf- 
fering, deformity and death, and for life and for useful- 
ness, and they won. Their victories are the marvels and 
the magic of the war. 



I 



CHAPTER III 

HOW THE INVENTORS FOUGHT 

THE Germans were quite confident of winning the 
war at the beginning because they intended to 
fight scientifically and use scientific weapons. 
For a long, long while warfare had been taught as a science 
in the military schools of all the great nations, but in the 
actual conflict of the battlefield man had regarded and 
referred to it as an art. Since it was a science in theory, 
why not make it a science in fact, thought the Prussian 
militarists. To this thought they added another, which 
was, that the first nation to do so would be invincible. 
So the Germans made scientific warfare, which was only 
another way of saying that war was a question of me- 
chanics. So the Great War became one of mechanics. 
It was conducted like a machine. 

Xow it is one thing to run a machine and it is quite 
another thing to invent one. Of course, an inventor of a 
machine can run the machine he invents. The Germans 
are a very efficient people and they learned to construct 
a military machine, but they did not invent any of the vital 
parts that went into the making of their machine. The 
Germans are not an inventive people, but they are very 
wonderful at adapting and improving the inventions of 

302 



HOW THE INVENTORS FOUGHT 303 

other people. Four of the instruments which were the 
most vital in their scientific and barbarous warfare were 
not the inventions of the Germans. The airplane, the sub- 
marine, barbed-wire, and the machine-gun were invented 
by Americans. The world is quite willing to give the Ger- 
mans the credit for inventing the Zeppelin because the 
Zeppelin was a failure. But the world will never forgive 
the Germans for inventing poison gas, not because it did 
not succeed, but because it was barbarous. Before the end 
of the war the Germans would very gladly have exchanged 
the success they won for the pledge they had violated in 
using it. They suffered more than they had gained by it. 
The Germans are the greatest chemists in the world, and 
they used this superiority in two of the most frightful 
weapons of the war, poison gas and high explosives. In 
these they were in time matched and surpassed. In all 
other inventions they showed themselves to be far out- 
matched. Their ability to copy and improve upon the in- 
ventions of the Allies became seriously handicapped as the 
war went on because their supplies of raw materials be- 
came exhausted. Rubber, cotton and copper were very 
essential for the successful manufacture of many weapons 
and under the British blockade it was absolutely impos- 
sible to obtain these materials. The Allies had an un- 
limited supply of these and other essential raw materials, 
and with the superior inventive genius of the Americans, 
French and British, new weapons and instruments of de- 
fense and destruction were being constantly increased as 



304 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

well as the mechanism of those already in use being im- 
proved. 

I cannot, of course, begin to number or describe the 
great number of inventions that the war brought into ex- 
istence to meet the vital needs of the belligerents. A great 
number of them were of the smallest mechanism and were 
designed for uses that were not in the least spectacular. 
For this reason, however, they were none the less remark- 
able. The whole character of the Great War was so dif- 
ferent from that of any other war that man had the need of 
new instruments, non-destructive as well as destructive. 
Necessity is the mother of invention, as you have heard it 
said ; and the necessities in the Great War were so increas- 
ingly numerous that inventions were constantly being 
made to meet them. So while on the battlefield the armies 
of the nations were fighting, the inventive thoughts of each 
nation were carrying on a rapid and continuous warfare 
of ideas that were turned into marvelous realities of me- 
chanical power. 

The ordnance department of each government had its 
experts continually at work on the science of gunnery, and 
independent inventors were seeking to devise new means 
of making guns larger, more accurate, and able to throw 
shells with a greater weight of high explosives. Guns, it 
need not be said, were the most essential of all destructive 
weapons. The Great War was not a war between rifles, 
that is, the infantry, but between guns, or the artillery. 
Even at close range it was the machine-gun and not the 
rifle which made a stubborn resistance and held up an ad- 



HOW THE INVENTORS FOUGHT 305 

vance. The Germans were the first to use the machine- 
gun effectively, and when the AUies, by various means in 
the attack, offset this advantage, the Germans invented the 
"pill-boxes," small concrete machine-gun fortresses to pro- 
tect the machine-gunners. 

The ordinary gun, that is, the gun of moderate caliber, 
with the exception of the French 75-millimeter, did not 
attract unusual attention in the war. The "barking" 75s, 
so-called because of the rapidity of fire which made a 
short, snappy report, was a murderous weapon, as the Ger- 
mans complained. It was a mobile field-piece that fired a 
fourteen-pound shell at the rate of twenty shots a minute 
and had a range of nearly four miles. Though a small 
field-piece, this was one of the most famous guns of the 
war. 

The super-guns, however, thrilled the world with both 
horror and admiration. The Germans started the war 
with an inmiense advantage in large guns, the 42-centimeter 
being their particular contribution to heavy artillery, and 
this was backed by the even more powerful Skoda howit- 
zers of the Austrians. These two pieces were not guns, 
properly speaking, but howitzers. The difference between 
the two is that a gun has a long bore intended to throw 
the shell with a flat trajectory. That is, the shell from a 
gun is thrown at the object and travels so fast that it goes 
more directly through the air to the target. A howitzer 
is a short weapon with a large caliber, which throws a shell 
at a high angle into the air to come down vertically upon 
the object. The marvel of the German 42-centimeter and 



306 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

the Austrian Skoda was their ability to throw great weights 
of high explosives to very great distances and batter to 
pieces the heaviest fortifications. The shells of these howit- 
zers exploded after they had penetrated the armor of the 
forts. 

The super-gun that attracted the most attention dur- 
ing the war was the long-range gun that the Germans 
fired from the St. Gobain Forest upon Paris, a distance 
of seventy-two miles, during the Spring offensive of 1918. 
This gun had to shoot around the edge of the earth to 
reach its target, and that target had to be many, many 
miles in size to be hit at all. If you want to realize the 
magnitude of this feat, which was notable for its magni- 
tude and not for the damage the gun was able to do, 
which was small, let me acquaint you with two or three 
facts. If a straight line was drawn from the gun in 
St. Gobain Forest to the city of Paris, it would have to 
pass three thousand, seven hundred and fifty feet below 
the earth's surface on account of the curve of the earth. 
When the gun was fired the shell had to go so high that 
midway in its course it passed above the belt of gravity 
that surrounds the earth and reached a height of twenty- 
four miles before beginning its descent. Ten miles above 
if the shell had eyes it would have looked through a pall 
of darkness upon the sun, a fiery red ball above it, and 
below upon an immense shining sphere, the earth. 

The super-gun which the Germans fired from the St. 
Gobain Forest was, however, nothing but a spectacular 
feat. Beyond kilhng a few innocent citizens and dama- 




Painting by Vincent Lynch 

Courtesy of the " Scientific American " 



© .w, 



THE AMERICAN CANNONEERS HURLED GAS ON THE GERMAN TRENCHES 



I 



HOW THE INVENTORS FOUGHT 307 

ging a few buildings, it accomplished nothing. If it were 
thought that the French would become frightened and 
want peace, that thought was disappointed. 

The French built a super-gun, the famous 52-centime- 
ter which they used in attacks along the Chemin des Dames 
and was intended later to shell the circle of forts around 
Metz. Huge naval guns, with ranges of eighteen and 
twenty miles, were mounted on rail trucks and used by the 
Allies to bombard important military positions behind the 
enemy's lines. In the Argonne the Americans mounted a 
16-inch naval gun with which they threw shells into Metz. 
But the Americans, long before the Germans had fired 
their super-gun from the St. Gobain Forest, designed a 
long-range gun that would throw a 400-pound shell one 
hundred and twenty miles. The gun, however, was never 
constructed. 

With the exception of the tank none of the vital and 
useful inventions of the war were of a "super" nature in 
size and weight. They were the delicate and subtle in- 
struments for observation, communication and detection. 
Destructive weapons like self -firing guns, hand-grenades, 
rifle-grenades and trench-mortars were brought to a high 
state of efficient mechanism. But such inventions as the 
sniperscope, an attachment fixed to the rifle through which 
the sharp-shooter could see the enemy from behind a 
parapet without exposing himself; the microphones by 
which the sappers, deep in the earth, could detect the pres- 
ence and direction of sounds in the enemy's mines; radio- 
telephones by which the aviator, high in the sky, could 



308 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

talk with another person on the earth, and the radio- 
telegraphy by which he could send messages; many 
improved methods of range-finding, the various methods 
of sweeping and salvaging mines, and devices for discov- 
ering and destroying submarines, these much less heralded 
and less known inventions constitute the great mechanical 
achievements of the war. 

There was another invention that was wholly deadly 
and destructive, but of this I need not say much. I refer 
to poison gas. The Germans took the world by surprise 
when they introduced it on the western front in April, 
1915. But in twenty- four hours the Allies had impro- 
vised a protection against poison gas, crude as it was. 
The gas-mask was perfected, and it was this invention 
that really beat the Germans at their own game. As the 
different forms of gas that were used became more and 
more deadly, the gas-mask had to be improved upon for 
protection. Rubber was essential in the making of the 
newer masks, which held boxes filled with chemicals and 
charcoal which was made of such various substances as 
peach-nuts, horse-chestnuts, cocoanut shells and so forth, 
and which purified the air that the soldier breathed through 
the mask. The Germans did not have the rubber to put 
into the manufacture of their gas-masks, being compelled 
to substitute leather, which was not nearly as effective nor 
as comfortable. But this was not the only result of their 
mistake in bringing poison gas into the war. 

At first the Germans sent the gas over in clouds, for 
which they had to select favorable positions and wait for 



HOW THE INVENTORS FOUGHT 309 

favorable winds. They were not always successful in 
either. On one occasion the wind shifted, blew the gas 
upon the Germans, who were not protected with masks, 
and killed eleven thousand of them. Later the gas was 
thrown over in shells, of which there were many kinds. 
There was the "tear-gas" shell which made the soldier 
weep; and gas shells that made the soldier sneeze and 
vomit. And there were the Yellow Cross, the Green Cross 
and the Blue Cross gas shells which worked very subtly. 
For instance, the Green Cross shell was filled with gas in 
a very dangerous liquid form which would soak into the 
earth or lie like little pools of water on the ground. The 
warm sun would vaporize the liquid and the unsuspecting 
soldiers would think that the vapor was nothing more than 
the mist rising from the earth in the morning. So the 
morning vapors had always to be tested to find out whether 
they were really nature steaming the earth dry under the 
hot morning sun or the deadly poison gas of the Ger- 
mans' invention. The Yellow Cross shell held the famous 
mustard gas, which would burn the flesh badly wherever 
it touched. 

But with all these fiendish gas inventions the AlHes 
were rapidly surpassing the Germans in the fiendish game 
that they proposed. The Americans had a deadlier gas, 
in unlimited quantities, which our chemists had invented 
and it was ready for use when the war came to an end. 
It was so deadly, it is said, that nothing could stand against 
it, and it was confidently asserted that the armistice saved 



310 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

whole armies and cities that stood in the way of the AlHes' 
advance to Berlin from being wiped out of existence. It 
was another instance of the Germans being beaten at their 
own game, as they were so many times during the war. 



CHAPTER IV 

HOW THE PEOPLE FOUGHT AT HOME 

I HAVE referred a number of times in the course of 
this narrative to the manner in which the people 
fought the war. They fought it in so many ways 
that to tell the whole story would be to fill volumes. In 
the next chapter I shall tell how they fought through the 
agency of the volunteer welfare service organizations. The 
total number of people who actually carried on the work 
of the Red Cross, the Y. M. C. A., the Salvation Army, 
the Knights of Columbus, and the Jewish Charitable As- 
sociation was very small in comparison with the population 
of the country. But these organizations could do very 
little without the support of the people, and that support 
was symbolized by money. The people of the nation gave 
the money which enabled these volunteer bodies to do their 
work. There were other ways in which the people fought 
by giving much more than mere money. Yet they fought 
with money, as you shall soon see. The war could no more 
be carried on without money than it could be carried on 
without soldiers. But just as the mind of the country was 
mobilized to conduct the war, so was the body of the coun- 
try mobilized to prosecute the war. Wealth and labor are 
the two essential factors in Hfe, and it is about wealth and 

311 



312 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

labor that I want to give you some idea in showing you 
how mightily and successfully the people fought. 

Of course, there are many sides to both these factors 
in the war that I cannot write about here. They would in 
themselves need many, many pages to be clearly described 
and explained. The results are what I want you to grasp 
and understand, and these results may be suggested in a 
few features and figures. Under the control of the gov- 
ernment many things were accomplished in war-time that 
were simply marvelous. Shipbuilding was one of the needs 
that had to be met. Of course, you immediately think of 
the troops that had to be transported to France. Im- 
portant as this was there were other equally vital needs 
for the use of ships. England helped us with her ships 
to transport troops to Europe when the great military 
crisis of 1918 came. But England and all Europe needed 
our foodstuffs and supplies, and all our ships of every 
description were engaged in carrying these to the popula- 
tions of the Old World. The shipbuilding "program" un- 
der govermnent direction was enormously speeded up, and 
a large amount of labor, skilled and unskilled, was drafted 
for this purpose. College students during the summer 
vacations were represented in the shipyards in very great 
numbers. 

Perhaps the greatest industry produced by the war was 
the making of munitions. The manufacture of munitions 
was not under direct government control. Contracts were 
let out to various plants that did the work. Of course, 
there were the government arsenals such as the famous 



HOW PEOPLE FOUGHT AT HOME 313 

Watertown Arsenal in Massachusetts, which made guns, 
and the naval arsenal such as the Torpedo Station at New- 
port, Rhode Island, where torpedoes and other naval arm- 
aments were made. But everywhere all over the country 
private manufacturers of all sorts of commodities, from 
automobiles to shoes, placed their plants at the disposal 
of the Government to make munitions. 

Hundreds of thousands of civilians, many who had 
never done work of this or any kind before, worked in these 
plants making munitions. These people were really sol- 
diers, fighting the war with their labor. Thousands and 
thousands were women who toiled at their labors with 
readily acquired skill and cheerfulness. The work was 
often very dangerous. The chemicals that were used in 
the manufacture of high explosives often affected the 
health of these workers. In England the women munition- 
workers were called "canaries" after the color of the well- 
known domestic singing-bird, because their skin would 
turn yellowish from the chemicals. Explosions, too, were 
very frequent, and hundreds of lives of both men and 
women were lost in this way. But nothing kept this army 
of industrial fighters from sticking to its post just hke the 
heroic troops in the trenches, and they stood at the lever 
and the bench until the victory for civilization was won. 

Now I want to tell you something about the two fac- 
tors without which the war could not have been fought at 
all. The mind of man is a very wonderful thing and all 
that it may devise and create comes to nothing without 
the sustenance of earth. Out of the earth man gets his 



314 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

food which sustains life. Out of the earth he also gets the 
wealth by which life is made comfortable and beautiful. 
Food and money were, then, the two essential things in 
the making of war. In regard to these, America played 
the most conspicuous part of any of the nations at war. 
It may be truthfully said that we fed the world, and we 
loaned such huge sums of money to our Allies that we be- 
came the banker in the cause for liberty. Let us look into 
the food question first. 

I am not going to speak of food conservation. I have 
not only referred to it at other places in this narrative, but 
your own experiences have told you about it. There was 
another side to the food question even more important 
than the saving of it. That was the production of it, 
which had first to be, before it could be used or saved. And 
in the production of food, despite the great number of 
"war gardens" or the "farmerettes," the knowledge of the 
average person is quite limited. And I can only make you 
understand what the production of food meant by records 
and figures. 

The United States, as I have said, had to produce 
enough food not only for consumption at home, but with 
sufficient surplus to feed its Allies and many neutral coun- 
tries. When we entered the war in 1917 much was done 
to stimulate larger crops in all the staples, such as wheat, 
potatoes, corn and so forth. To do so two quite necessary 
facts had to be considered. The first was the question 
of seeds and the second was the increase of acreage. The 
Department of Agriculture purchased large supplies of 



HOW PEOPLE FOUGHT AT HOME 315 

sound seeds which it distributed, large seed dealers were 
licensed by the Food Administration to control seed-prices 
and the number of seed growers' associations cooperated 
by selling at a fair price. 

The next problem in production was to increase the 
acreage under cultivation. This was successfully done. In 
1917, in the leading cereals, with potatoes, tobacco and 
cotton, there were 283,000,000 acres in crops, against 261,- 
000,000 for the previous year; in 1918 there were 289,000,- 
000 acres, against the five-year period before the war of 
248,000,000, an increase of 41,000,000 acres over the pre- 
war period. The acreage in wheat during the second year 
of our participation in the war showed an increase of 
3,500,000 acres over any previous record. These are very 
eloquent figures and showed to what extent the farmers of 
the country labored to fight the war with food. 

With this immense yield of crops the farmers had their 
problems. One was financial, which was met by the Gov- 
ernment and such resources as the Patriotic Farmers' 
Fund and the Farmers' Loan Board, from which the farm- 
ers might borrow money. The latter was supplied by a 
group of New York business men for the aid of small 
farmers in New York State, but it was typical of the wise 
insight into the farmers' need everywhere for the increase 
of crops. The financial problem, however, was not nearly 
so serious as the labor problem. How to harvest these im- 
mense crops when labor was so scarce was the farmer's 
greatest problem. 

A very large amount of farm labor was drawn into 



316 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

military service. The munitions factories and Govern- 
ment works offering high wages had taken a large number 
as well. The shortage of farm labor was critical both to 
the farmer and the country. The Government through 
the Departments of Agriculture and of Labor, in coopera- 
tion with agricultural colleges, State councils of defense, 
and so forth, organized a campaign for volunteer farm 
hands. The "Work or Fight" order was pressed to the 
limit. Soon college students, the Boys' Working Reserve, 
the Woman Land Army of America and other organiza- 
tions and individuals responded. In addition business men, 
clerks and factory hands volunteered their vacation-time. 
A million of these made up a volunteer harvest army, and 
together with members of the organizations named above 
gathered in the great crops without a loss. 

In the harvest fields millions and millions of Ameri- 
cans fought the war with food production. 

The patriotism of the American people was in no way 
more clearly expressed than in the financial support of the 
Goverimient in the war. The money to fight the war was 
raised in three ways : by enormously increased taxation, by 
the five Liberty Loans and the sale of War Saving 
Stamps. For the five Liberty Loans the people sub- 
scribed over twenty-one billion dollars. Taxation through 
to the year 1919 netted ten billion dollars, and the sale of 
War Saving Stamps yielded one billion and a half. These 
figures show nearly thirty-two billions of dollars given and 
loaned to the Government in behalf of freedom. Of this 
amount eight billion dollars was loaned by the United 



HOW PEOPLE FOUGHT AT HOME 317 

States to eleven nations who were our Allies in the war. 
It was another splendid fighting record of the people of 
the country. The total war debt of the United States is 
twenty-one billion dollars, a low price for the saving of 
civilization. 



CHAPTER V 

VOLUNTEER WELFARE SERVICE 

THE Great War, as you have often been told, was 
not a war of armies, but a war of nations. Even 
more than a war of nations, it was a war of 
peoples. In a sense there were no neutral individuals any- 
where. Either a person believed that an autocratic or 
democratic form of government was best for a state. There 
are a great manj^ people in the world who do not care about 
such a thing as liberty in its highest form, that is to say, 
they do not care about having a voice in making the laws 
they are obliged to obey so long as they are made comfort- 
able. This was the case with the German people. The 
rulers of Germany were shrewd enough to make the people 
comfortable, to abolish poverty and to protect them by a 
state and industrial insurance against the want of old age. 
But not only in Germany, but in other countries as well, 
there were a great many people who believed that an 
autocratic form of government was best for many reasons. 
When the people of the world saw how an autocratic gov- 
ernment made war, many of them changed their minds. 
JNIany of them learned for the first time how an autocratic 
government was run. The war also showed the people of 
such countries as Germany, Austria and Turkey what ad- 

318 



VOLUNTEER WELFARE SERVICE 319 

vantages and privileges the people in the democratic coun- 
tries possessed who had a voice in making the laws of these 
countries, and were convinced that the blessings of democ- 
racy were far greater than the blessings of autocracy, even 
if they could be called so. 

The people of the world, with these thoughts in mind, 
soon began to look upon the war not as an affair of their 
separate governments, but as an individual affair which 
affected their personal existence. So as never before in 
the history of the world the Great War enlisted the energy 
of every individual in all the nations that fought. The 
millions and millions of soldiers who fought in the trenches 
were but the advance guard, one might say, of the bellig- 
erents; the far greater number of millions, men, women, 
and even children, made up the main armies upon which 
victory depended and they fought for the most ]3art with 
healing weapons of peace. A large part, of course, worked 
to supply the armies with munitions, with guns and high 
explosives so vitally necessary to the actual fighting. The 
munitions industry drew heavily upon civilian labor, and 
in the great manufacturing countries such as the United 
States, England, and France, it was one of the marvels 
which the people of these nations performed during the 
war. 

There were a hundred different ways in which the peo- 
ple helped to fight. One could see that by the mere activ- 
ity of one's neighbors, by recalling one's own efforts to 
be valuable and useful to the Government in the task of 
carrying on the war. But there were a number of organ- 



320 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

izations that carried out a program of activities in sup- 
port of the Government in war-tune which accomplished 
deeds so substantial and vital that without them the Gov- 
ernment would have found its task of victory very much 
more difficult and hazardous. These were the Volunteer 
Welfare Service organizations, such as the Red Cross, the 
Y. M. C. A., the Salvation Army, the Knights of Colum- 
bus, the Jewish Charitable Societies, and the American 
Library Asociation. I want to tell you something about 
the work these organizations accomplished, not the actual 
deeds of their workers, because it would take many volumes 
to do that, but something of the purpose that each had in 
serving the Govermnent and the armies, and the records 
they made in fulfilling the purpose each had to perform. 

The Red Cross and the Y. M. C. A. have been called 
the "right and left arm" of the army. You must under- 
stand that these as well as the other volunteer welfare serv- 
ice organizations neither looked for nor received any finan- 
cial support from the Government. The funds with which 
they had to work were all volunteer contributions from the 
people. Most of the workers who performed the duties 
of these organizations, except the Red Cross, were trained 
and efficient individuals who gave up remunerative occu- 
pations and professions in civilian life and had to be paid 
for their services. The Red Cross was a wholly philan- 
thropic society. It is called the "Mother of the World." 
All the workers from the officials down, from Mr. Henry 
P. Davidson, the famous banker, to the humblest worker, 
gave their services free. Membership in the Red Cross, 



VOLUNTEER WELFARE SERVICE 321 

unlike the membership in the other organizations, was 
open to everybody in the nation, irrespective of race, creed 
or age. But all of these organizations, as I have said, were 
supported by the people's money and through them the 
people fought the war both at home and abroad. 

The purposes of the Red Cross were to care for our 
soldiers and sailors wherever and whenever needed; to 
render assistance to the armies and peoples of the Allied 
countries and to help in the restitution of communities 
and the rebuilding of towns and villages devastated by the 
war. These cover a multitude of activities that it would 
take several pages just to mention. The American Red 
Cross carried its activities into France, Italy, Russia, Ser- 
bia, Roumania, Belgium, Armenia, Syria, Palestine, 
Egypt, Poland and Siberia. At the same time, it was 
doing extensive work at home for the army and navy. 
Some idea of what it did may be had from considering 
the work in France. There was reconstruction and relief 
in the devastated districts, the relief and care of refugees, 
relief and prevention of tuberculosis among the soldiers 
and underfed civilians, the care and nourishment of chil- 
dren to reduce infant mortality, the building of hospitals, 
their equipment and supplies, supplying and operating 
ambulances, the recreation and welfare of the American 
army, maintaining a canteen service and corps of doctors 
and nurses. 

Even this mere tabulation scarcely gives a full grasp 
of what the Red Cross accomplished. Perhaps a few fig- 
ures will help to emphasize the work of this organization. 



322 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

It had 10,000 nurses in France. Every day 20,000 sol- 
diers were served with food and hot drinks and comforts. 
Fully 5,000 tons of material were handled weekly, which 
kept 400 motor-trucks in constant operation. The Red 
Cross built eight hospitals in France for American sol- 
diers that were entirely run by its members, besides a num- 
ber of others for French civilians. It maintained a hos- 
pital at Evian where 200,000 children were treated. It 
furnished supplies of all kinds to 3,800 hospitals in France. 
What the Red Cross did in France it did in the other 
countries I named above on a smaller scale. It collected 
and spent enormous sums of money to carry on this work 
of mercy and healing and never was money given for a 
better cause or spent to such good purpose. 

The purpose of the Red Cross, as I have showed, was 
relief work. The purpose of the Y. M. C. A. was largely 
recreation and amusement. It sought to improve the moral 
and physical condition of the army. The organization 
built "huts" near all of the army bases in France for the 
comfort and amusement of the soldiers. These huts con- 
tained a canteen room, a lecture hall, and smaller rooms 
for the meeting of classes or groups and were always sit- 
uated near the athletic field where the soldiers took their 
recreation. In these huts addresses and moving picture 
shows were given for the entertainment of the troops. 
The work was in charge of secretaries, of whom there were 
over 600 in France. The Y. M. C. A. shipped tons and 
tons of athletic goods to France, besides great quantities 
of magazines and books. The daily attendance at the 



VOLUNTEER WELFARE SERVICE 323 

Y. M. C. A. huts, the "little brown house with the Red 
Triangle," in France was 60,000. The activities of the 
Y. M. C. A. workers extended right up to the front line. 
The army greatly appreciated the work done by the 
Association. 

The "Sallies," as the workers of the Salvation Army 
are called by the soldiers, were greatly endeared to the 
army in France for their absolute devotion under all sorts 
of conditions. Not only endeared, but the Salvation Aiuny 
was beloved by the troops. In their work they carried 
out the true principles of democracy in sacrifice and de- 
votion. It is said that four days after the German army 
entered Belgium to wreck and ruin, the Salvation Army 
entered to save and heal. The Salvation Army lassies 
made doughnuts by the thousands for the troops, which 
pleased the soldiers very much. In the Salvation Army 
ambulances over 100,000 wounded soldiers were taken 
from the battlefields to the dressing stations. The organ- 
ization maintained nearly one hundred hotels for the use 
of soldiers and sailors. Hundreds of thousands of parcels 
of food and clothing were distributed among the troops. 
Not only did the Salvation Army perform these helpful 
and merciful duties, but fully 100,000 of the members of 
this Christian organization devoted to the ideals of peace 
fought in the trenches. The Salvation Army became the 
most popular body of welfare workers in the war. 

The Knights of Columbus, a sectarian organization, 
was of great usefulness during the war. Its members 
were of the Catholic faith. The "K. of C." sustained a 



324 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

clean, moral life among the troops. It supplied the sol- 
diers with tens of thousands of religious articles. A great 
many huts were established By the society in France, with 
two thousand secretaries. It met the demand of a weekly 
call for stationery amounting to 3,000,000 sheets of writ- 
ing-paper and 1,500,000 envelopes. Athletic goods by the 
ton were distributed. To show the extent of its services 
in supplying the soldiers with the articles that made them 
happy, a single order of the organization that was sent to 
France contained 50,000,000 cigarettes, 2,000,000 bouillon 
cubes, 2,000,000 packages of chewing-gum and 110 tons of 
sweet chocolates. 

The Jewish Charitable Association was the other great 
sectarian organization that rendered immense service in 
the war. Its chief function was the relief of refugee Jews 
in the various countries that had a large Jewish popula- 
tion and that were overrun by the armies of the belligerents. 
It did wonderful relief work in Russia, Austria-Hungary, 
Greece, Turkey, Serbia, Roumania, Montenegro, Bul- 
garia, German Poland, France, Morocco and Palestine. 
In this work it provided the fleeing Jews with trains, 
guides, special transportation for the sick with physicians, 
and money, food, clothing and shelter. One of the special 
efforts made was in taking care of the education of chil- 
dren during the disrupted conditions of the war. It will 
have an important influence in the establislmient of an in- 
dependent Jewish state in Palestine, now that it is happily 
freed from the bondage of the Turks. 

For the intellectual interests and mental entertainment 



VOLUNTEER WELFARE SERVICE 325 

of the soldiers and sailors, the American Library Associa- 
tion did a really wonderful work. In France it worked in 
cooperation wtih the Y. M. C. A., Salvation Army, and 
Knights of Columbus. In the United States the Associa- 
tion erected thirty-six camp library buildings and forty- 
one large camp libraries were established. It collected 
over 4,000,000 books. Nearly 2,000,000 of these were 
shipped overseas and distributed from headquarters at 
Paris wherever they were needed. The mind of the sol- 
dier was quite as necessary to serve as his body, and it can 
be safely said that the work of the American Library As- 
sociation performed a service that was an important con- 
tribution towards victory. 

These Volunteer Welfare Service organizations made 
a bright page in the history of the war which some day, 
when it is fully written, will fill the people with pride and 
astonishment. 



PART VI 
THE GREAT PERSONALITIES OF THE WAR 



CHAPTER I 



THE RULERS 



IT is interesting to know something about the person- 
ality and achievements of the men and women who, 
on account of their positions, figured most promi- 
nently in the war. Destiny has a strange way of dealing 
with men, and no affair in the world's history ever swept 
individuals so ruthlessly from public gaze as the World 
War. On the other hand, no event ever gave so many op- 
portunities for men to make immortal names for them- 
selves. The Great War was like an upheaval of nature, 
and for a time it was beyond the control of man. It shook 
men from their exalted positions, from honor and fame, — ■ 
men who had commanded in the years before the war. 
One by one they went tumbling down. Others came and 
took their places; some lasted for a time and they, too, 
passed into the obscurity that swallows the unsuccessful. 
A number of individuals, few though they were, were made 
greater by their positions, and now and then the individual 
gave a luster to the position that he held. The Great War 
shook the very foundations of the world. Few things of 
the old order survived it. Much that civilization had 
boasted of was cast into a pile of ruins and the thrones of 
Europe were thrown on the scrap heap. Many a scepter 

329 



330 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

that had glittered in history, many a crown that had won 
the slavish obedience of generations are now tarnished 
and in fragments. Only four kings who were ruling when 
their nations entered the war were seated on their thrones 
when the war ended. The imperial dynasties of Russia, 
Germany, and Austria came to an end as a result of the 
war. Statesmen and generals who were in high office and 
supreme command when the war began had lost their 
power before the end and were all but forgotten. The 
men who brought victory were the men who were forged 
into greatness by the war itself. 

I want to tell you a little about the men and women 
who were conspicuous in the war. I shall not tell you 
about what they did in the war because that has been 
touched upon in the course of this narrative, and the fuller 
records of their deeds have yet to be revealed. I merely 
want to give you a hint of their characters and a few brief 
facts about their lives. When you come at a later time 
to study their lives you will possess a kind of acquaintance 
with these men and women that will help you to under- 
stand their achievements in the war. In this chapter I 
shall sketch the rulers who were conspicuous for one rea- 
son or another during the war. 

Most notable of all the kings in the war was Albert 
I of Belgium. History will regard him as the "Champion 
of Honor" because he refused to bargain with the Ger- 
mans to save his crown or his nation from destruction. He 
was born in April, 1875, and succeeded his uncle, Leo- 
pold II, in 1909, as king of the Belgians. As Prince Al- 



THE RULERS 331 

bert he visited the United States in 1898 and was much 
admired for his simple and democratic character. He had 
a deep interest in the world's work and the men who per- 
formed it. Once he lived in England as a newspaper re- 
porter, and, so disguised, visited the shipbuilders and 
fishermen to learn the conditions under which they worked. 
In America he took a great interest in the railroad prob- 
lems. He has a wide knowledge of mechanics and once 
remarked: "I never see a machine or a motor without 
wanting to know the what and how of it." 

When Albert was still a prince he wished to know all 
about the great African colony of the Congo Free State, 
which he was to rule. So he spent three months in that 
tropical land, where he walked some fifteen hundred miles. 
The natives called him "Tall Man, Breaker of Stones," 
because it was his habit to indulge in this vigorous and 
useful exercise. 

When a prince Albert married the Princess Elizabeth 
of Bavaria, the daughter of Duke Charles Theodor, a fa- 
mous oculist, who devoted his time to serving the people in 
the hospitals of Munich. The Princess Elizabeth had a 
thorough training as a nurse and had studied medicine. 
She was a splendid helpmate for her royal husband. As 
king and queen they took a deep interest in the welfare 
of their subjects, from the common workman to the most 
intellectual and artistic of Belgians. They have always 
insisted that their children should have as companions the 
children of honest men and workers. Unlike so many 



332 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

royal parents the royal children of Belgium have been 
taught that idleness is a vice. 

When King Albert entered Brussels on November 22, 
1918, after four years of exile and at the head of his 
army and the troops of the Allies, he was hailed by the 
people with great enthusiasm. He had not only won a 
military victory, but a moral triumph. He had preserved 
honor among kings. 

Next to King Albert the most prominent monarch of 
the war was King George of England. King Albert is 
universally known and admired because of his noble be- 
havior when his kingdom was crushed under the heel of 
war. Fate did not try King George in the same way. 
He was at the head of a mighty empire strong enough to 
defend itself, and so of course he neither suffered exile nor 
endured personal danger on the field of battle. But he 
proved himself in every way a king by fulfilling his royal 
duties to the utmost. 

King George was born at Marlborough House, Lon- 
don, in June, 1865. He was the second son of the then 
Prince of Wales, afterwards King Edward VII. His 
elder brother, the Duke of Clarence, died in 1892, and as 
Duke of Cornwall George became heir to the throne, which 
he ascended in 1910. As the "sailor-prince" King George 
rose to the rank of admiral in the British navy, a position 
which he earned by brave and efficient work. When he 
was heir to the throne King George made a tour of the 
British colonies. After he became king he visited India 



THE RULERS 333 

to be crowned emperor of that realm of the empire, some- 
thing which no British monarch had done before him. 

In 1893 the king married Princess Victoria Mary, the 
daughter of the Duke of Teck. Six children were born of 
this union, and the eldest was Edward Albert, the young 
Prince of Wales, who, after a notable career in the war, 
has made a visit to Canada and the United States. King 
George is noted for his intellectual qualities and his do- 
mestic affections. He is much beloved by his subjects, 
who affectionately refer to him as "Good old George." 
During the war he worked very hard. He visited hun- 
dreds of hospitals, inspected hundreds of munition plants, 
reviewed two million troops and presented over twelve 
thousand decorations. He is one of the very few kings 
who survived the war and holds a stronger place in the 
affection of his subjects than ever before. 

A king whom the war taught the outside world to 
admire and respect is King Victor Emmanuel III of Italy, 
the patriot king and comrade of his troops on the battle 
fronts. When Victor Emmanuel came to the throne the 
Italians regarded him as a dreamer. But he proved him- 
self to be a man of practical courage and action. He was 
born in November, 1869, and was the only son of King 
Humbert. In 1896 he married Princess Helene of Monte- 
negi'o. He ascended the throne in 1900, when his father. 
King Humbert, was assassinated by an Italian anarchist. 

In King Victor Emmanual the people of Italy found 
a true expression of their democratic sentiments. He was 
ever among his troops sympathizing with and encouraging 



334 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

them and sharing their dangers. He worked as hard as 
any soldier or statesman for the good of Italy. Like King 
George of England, King Victor Emmanuel reigns but 
does not rule, and so true did he keep to this ideal all 
during the war that he came through it more beloved as a 
man and more trusted and admired as a king. 

King Peter of Serbia as a ruler suffered defeat and 
exile like King Albert of Belgium. In his case the ex- 
perience was much more pitiable because he was aged and 
infirm. King Peter Karageorgevitch was born in 1844 
and elected (the Serbians, as the Poles, in former times 
elected their king) to the throne in 1903. For a while the 
other nations refused to recognize him because they 
thought that his agents had something to do with the as- 
sassination of King Alexandra and Queen Draga, who 
reigned before him. Under King Peter the Serbs pros- 
pered. He was intelligent and resourceful and encouraged 
education among the people. Five months before the war 
began King Peter gave up the throne because of his age. 
But he took up the duties of kingship again to revive the 
spirit of the army for the war; the soldiers welcomed him 
with enthusiasm and fought with great bravery and endur- 
ance under his leadership. When Serbia was crushed, 
King Peter went into exile in Italy, a man broken in 
mind and body. When the war was victoriously ended and 
the new Jugo-Slav state was founded by the Peace Con- 
ference, of which Serbia was the cornerstone, the heir to 
King Peter's throne, Prince Alexander, was made regent 
owing to the infirmity of his father. 



THE RULERS 335 

Two women rulers became very prominent because of 
the war, though for very different reasons. Only one of 
these women ruled in her own right, the Grand Duchess 
JNIarie Adelaide of Luxemburg. The other was Queen 
Marie of Roumania, the consort of King Ferdinand I. 
Grand Duchess Marie Adelaide is prominent by the force 
of circumstances rather than by any notable deeds. The 
little duchy over which she ruled, with a population less 
than that of the city of Buffalo, was too small to resist in 
the slightest the German invasion. The young sovereign 
met the German troops at the frontier and protested 
against the invasion, but that was the extent of her resist- 
ance. After that she was a prisoner in her own capital all 
through the war. After the war she was deposed by the 
Luxemburgers and her younger sister succeeded to the 
ducal throne. Marie Adelaide, as so many of the Luxem- 
burgers, belonged to the Catholic faith. She was ex- 
tremely pious. The effect of her character upon the court 
was to make its manners puritanic and its etiquette very 
rigid. This helpless young girl, so little known to the 
great world before the war, was suddenly flashed upon the 
very center of the stage to linger for a moment, a tragic 
figure, and then be swept away in mystery. With one 
brave act to her credit she will be remembered with more 
pity than admiration in the future. 

Queen Marie of Roumania in popular estimation has 
a place similar to that of King Albert of Belgium. Her 
fame is not nearly so universal. The deeds for which she 
has won the adoration of her people and the admiration 



836 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

of Europe are quite different from those of the Belgian 
monarch. This beautiful queen endured the agony of her 
country's invasion and enslavement with a spirit that was 
heroic. But ever since she came to the throne with her 
husband, Ferdinand, in 1914, she has strongly influenced 
the national life of Roumania. She associated herself with 
the life and traditions of the people. The local festivals 
were kept alive by her, and, like Carmen Sylva, the queen 
who preceded her on the throne, she collected and preserved 
the legends and ballads of the country. She gave her pat- 
ronage to the national theater, where only the plays of 
native writers are performed. During the war Queen 
Marie went freely among the wounded and sick, nursing 
them and caring for their wants. The peasants call her a 
saint and even those most dangerously stricken with typhus 
fever would insist upon kissing her hand. She never re- 
fused this devotion, though it put her in great danger of 
her life. She was a noble woman as well as a noble queen. 

The President of the French Republic, Raymond Poin- 
care, was perhaps less in the public eye of the world than 
the rulers of the other great powers. Circumstances per- 
haps did not permit that he should be, as were the govern- 
mental and military officials who carried on the war for 
France in behalf of the people. The President of the 
French Republic exercised nothing like the personal power 
that was exercised by the President of the United States 
during the war. But INI. Poincare is a very notable and 
distinguished personage. 

He was born in 1863 at Bar-le-Duc and had his early 



THE RULERS 337 

education at the Lycee, where he took all of the prizes. 
While very young he became a soldier and rose to be a 
captain in the Chasseurs. At twenty he established him- 
self in Paris as an avocat. In 1887 he was elected a Dep- 
uty for the Department of the Meuse. He has held sev- 
eral important cabinet positions. In 1913 he was elected 
President of the French Repubhc. His administration 
has been full of brilliant achievements. M. Poincare is a 
scholar and a man of letters. 

All that Mr. Wilson has been in the war is public his- 
tory. The future historian will have a great deal to say 
about the motives that prompted his acts. What the na- 
tion and the world at large scarcely realized in the con- 
fusion and controversy of the war and the making of peace 
that followed is, that a httle less than fifteen years ago, 
Mr. Wilson was a historian and college president. As the 
head of Princeton University he was well-nigh obscure to 
the world that has since come to know him as the Presi- 
dent of the United States. 

Woodrow Wilson was born in Virginia in December, 
1856, and graduated from Princeton and later from the 
law school of the University of Virginia. He practiced 
law in Atlanta, Georgia, from which he passed to the pro- 
fession of teaching. In 1902 he was elected president of 
Princeton University and resigned in 1910. In 1911 Mr. 
Wilson was elected governor of New Jersey, from which 
office he resigned in 1913 to enter the White House and 
take up his duties as President of the United States. Mr. 
Wilson is the author of many works on history and juris- 



338 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

prudence. He was one of the American Peace Commis- 
sioners at the Peace Conference at Paris, where he was 
instrumental, as the chief promoter, in securing a cove- 
nant for a League of Nations, intended to prevent war in 
the future. For this effort Mr. Wilson has been called 
an idealist and a visionary. This, as well as a number of 
other puzzling features about Mr. Wilson's character and 
acts, time alone can solve. 

No man has been more written about, whose character 
and deeds have been more often and variouslj^ discussed 
than Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States. 
No single individual in the course of the war has exercised 
more personal power. No one has received from his peers 
among the potentates of nations the honor that he has re- 
ceived nor from the common people the acclaim that wel- 
comed his visit to Europe. He has supplied from the be- 
ginning of the war the phrases that men have repeated in 
the council chamber, in the street, in the home and on the 
battlefield. He was the man whose will all nations aimed 
to satisfy. 



CHAPTER II 



THE PRIME MINISTERS 



THE burden of the war fell more heavily upon the 
shoulders of two types of men than upon any 
other. One type was at the head of the civil gov- 
ernment of the various countries and the other was at the 
head of the armies in the field. I refer to the prime min- 
isters and the generals. Our system of government is 
quite different from that of the European countries. Our 
President is the chief executive and has a cabinet which is 
called his "official family." He consults the members of 
the cabinet upon all matters pertaining to the domestic 
and foreign affairs of the nation. The cabinet members, 
who are each at the head of a governmental department 
such as the treasury, the army, the navy, and so forth, are 
responsible only to the President and are appointed for 
the term that he holds office. In England, France, Italy, 
and the other European countries associated with us in the 
war, the cabinet which is formed and presided over by the 
first, or prime minister, is responsible to the Parliament 
of the country. It may be voted out of office by the Par- 
liament on any measure that is brought up for considera- 
tion and at any time. In almost every European country 
on the Allied side, whether a monarchy or republic, the 

339 



340 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

ruler so-called, whether king or president, reigns but does 
not rule. The actual ruler of the country is the Prime 
Minister, who becomes so by the grace of the monarch or 
chief executive, who is expressing the will of the people. 
It was to the Prime Ministers, then, that the people of the 
Allied countries looked to win the war. 

I am not going to tell you about all of the Prime Min- 
isters that held office in the Allied countries during the 
war. Some countries had more than others during the 
four years of the conflict. I am not going to tell you about 
them because they failed in the opportunity they had to 
conduct the war successfully. For instance, Mr. Asquith, 
who was Prime Minister of England when the war started, 
had to give way to Mr. Lloyd George because of his 
failure to do a number of things that would have helped 
to win the war. The same may be said of M. Viviani, M. 
Painleve and other Prime Ministers of France, all of 
whom had to give way for M. Clemenceau, who was strong 
and clever enough to do just the right things that brought 
victory. So I am only going to tell you a little about the 
Prime Ministers who came into power when things looked 
bad for their countries and brought them through to vic- 
tory. In doing this they did more than help the particu- 
lar country that they happened to belong to ; they labored 
for the most precious heritage of modern civilization, the 
freedom and security of national life everywhere. 

The men whose lives I shall sketch briefly are David 
Lloyd George of England, Georges Clemenceau of 
France, Vittorio Orlando of Italy, and Eleutherios Veni- 



THE PRIME MINISTERS 341 

zelos of Greece. Here are the victorious Prime Ministers 
of three great Powers and one small state, and you will no 
doubt wonder why M. Venizelos of Greece is included. 
You will learn why when I come to tell you about him. 
Before I begin to write about David Lloyd George, I 
wish to mention another Prime Minister who was in power 
when the war began. This was M. Sazonof of Russia, a 
zealous and honest patriot, who ably represented Russia 
in the negotiations that preceded the outbreak of the war 
and who guided the empire through the conflict until the 
Russian Revolution. Perhaps more than any fallen Prime 
Minister he deserves to be remembered for his efforts in 
behalf of the Allied cause. 

The most famous among the Prime Ministers of the 
war is David Lloyd George, the "little fighting Welsh- 
man." The rise of this man has been one of the most 
remarkable in the political history of this century. He 
was the son of poor Welsh parents, born in Manchester, 
England, in January, 1863. His father died when he was 
a little boy and he was taken with his mother to live with 
an uncle, who was a shoemaker in a little village in North 
Wales. By hard labor and saving the uncle was able to 
educate his nephew to be a solicitor. After two years of 
successful practice young David Lloyd George was elected 
to Parliament from his home district. 

Mr. Lloj'-d George's career in Parliament was full of 
bold and daring progress. Though a member of the Lib- 
eral Party he was extremely radical in his views and opin- 
ions. As a lad he had been touched by the conditions of 



342 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

the workingman and he sought from the beginning of his 
pohtical career to work for laws in behalf of the masses of 
the peoi^le. He wanted, and he succeeded, in making "de- 
mocracy safe for England." So much did he demand in 
this respect that he was regarded as a rank socialist and 
was thoroughly hated by the aristocracy of Great Britain. 
He was very unpopular during the Boer War, when his 
life was often threatened for condemning the English 
government for conducting a war of conquest against a 
weak people. The indomitable qualities of such a man as 
Lloyd George would let nothing stand in the way of his 
progress. 

He soon became a member of the Cabinet of Sir Henry 
Campbell-Bannerman. This far-seeing statesman saw in 
the young Welshman a man of mettle and ideas. Though 
he was given a minor office, that of the President of. the 
Board of Trade, he soon justified Campbell-Bannerman's 
faith by settling a labor crisis which prevented a general 
railroad strike all over Great Britain. The success of this 
settlement had saved the country a great economic loss and 
the people began to notice the constructive talents of the 
young Welshman. When Mr. Asquith succeeded Camp- 
bell-Bannerman, who died in 1908, he made Mr. Lloyd 
George the Chancellor of the Exchequer, that is. Minister 
of Finance, which was the office next in importance to that 
of the Prime Minister himself. It was this cabinet posi- 
tion that Mr. Lloyd held when the war began. 

It was this doughty Welshman, almost alone, who saw 
things going wrong in the first year or two of the war and, 



THE PRIME MINISTERS 343 

to set them right, he began attacking conditions left and 
right. Munitions was one of the things that was wrong, 
in Mr. Lloyd George's opinion. His criticism of the mu- 
nitions supply became so frank and insistent that the Gov- 
ernment so much as said, "Well, make them right." So 
they created a new Cabinet position and made him Min- 
ister of Munitions. He succeeded so well with this task 
that when Lord Kitchener, who was Minister of War, 
was lost at sea, the Government made him the new Min- 
ister of War. And in this position he also succeeded so 
well that when the nation realized that it needed a strong 
and determined man as Prime Minister to pilot the country 
to victory. King George, expressing the will of his sub- 
jects, asked Mr. Lloyd George to take Mr. Asquith's place 
and conduct the war. This was in December, 1916. 

As Prime Minister Mr. Lloyd George brought the 
British empire safely and successfully through the war. 
He achieved three big things which helped to bring vic- 
tory. He created a special War Council made up of men 
free from governmental duties who were given supreme 
control in managing the nation's business during the war. 
He created an Imperial War Cabinet in which all of Great 
Britain's colonies were represented. And he fought for 
and achieved unity of military command among the Allies. 
This last was brought about in a daring manner which 
threatened his downfall. As a stepping-stone to unity of 
military command he created the Supreme War Council 
of the Allies, and at one of its sessions at Paris he made 
the famous "brutally frank" speech in criticism of his coun- 



344 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

try's attitude towards the conduct of the war. All Parlia- 
ment and England was aroused by his words. But he 
went home from Paris and met his critics with a daring 
speech. Once more the "httle fighting Welshman" won. 
On that occasion he said, "I made up my mind to take risks 
and I took them, to arouse public sentiment, not here 
merely, but in France, in Italy, and in America. It is not 
easy to rouse public opinion. I may know nothing of mili- 
tary strategy, but I do know something of political strat- 
egy. To raise a row is the only way to get a job through. 
I determined to make a disagreeable speech that would 
force everybody to talk about this scheme, and they have 
talked about it. The result is that America is in, Italy is 
in, France is in, Britain is in, and public opinion is in, 
and that is vital." It was the Paris speech to which Mr. 
Lloyd George referred in Parliament, that led to the selec- 
tion of General Foch as Commander-in-Chief of all the 
Allies' military forces. How important this selection was 
in winning the war you all know who have read this narra- 
tive. No Prime Minister deserves more credit for his 
work in behalf of victory than belongs to this remarkable 
and energetic Welshman, David Lloyd George. 

There is a similarity of character between David Lloyd 
George and Georges Clemenceau. Both men forged their 
way to eminence by sheer personal ability. Both are fight- 
ers. Both have labored in behalf of the people's interest. 
As England called Lloyd George to the helm of affairs to 
drive and guide the nation to victory, so did France call 



THE PRIME MINISTERS 345 

Georges Clemenceau to the helm of affairs to guide the 
French to victory. 

Clemenceau is called ''The Tiger," and well deserves 
the name. He has "torn, clawed and bitten his way into 
power." There are other names by which he is known. 
They call him "The Destroyer of Ministries," and "The 
Stormy Petrel of French Politics." All through his long 
political career he has destroyed ministries and politicians. 
It was through destruction that he came at last to save 
France. The country had to get rid of politicians and 
traitors who were hampering the way to victory. It was 
necessary for the Government to have an absolutely free 
hand to carry on the war successfully. There was no man 
in sight who seemed to have the power to destroy the 
enemies at home. Suddenly the people remembered 
Clemenceau and called for "The Tiger." President Poin- 
care, who in former days had suffered from the bitter at- 
tacks of Clemenceau, asked him to become Prime Minister 
and save France from her enemies within and without. It 
was in 1917 that Clemenceau, in the fullness of age but 
with the vigor and audacity of a young man, began the 
most wonderful period of his career. 

Clemenceau was born in the little village of Mouillion- 
en-Pareds in La Vandee, in September, 1841. He came 
of five generations of doctors and was himself sent to Paris 
at the age of nineteen to study medicine. La Vandee was 
in those days the hotbed of Royalism, and it is strange 
that it should give to France her most ardent Republican 
patriot. As a boy and all through his long life it was 



346 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

Clemenceau's purpose to work for the France that he 
loved with a deep passion. In 1865 Clemenceau came to 
America, at first hving in New York, where he practiced 
medicine but spent most of his time, as he says, reading 
and studying in the old Astor Library. Later he taught 
in a Miss Aitken's school for young ladies at Stamford, 
Connecticut. Here he met a young lady. Miss Mary 
Plummer, who became his wife. In 1870 Clemenceau, with 
his American wife, was back in France. It was the year 
of the Franco-Prussian War and young Clemenceau was 
appointed Mayor of Montmartre, a district of Paris. The 
following year he was elected a Deputy to the National 
Assembly, in which he strongly opposed the Treaty of 
Peace with Prussia that robbed France of Alsace and Lor- 
raine. From 1871 to 1876 Clemenceau was a member of 
the Paris Municipal Council and became its president. In 
1876 he was again elected a Deputy to the National As- 
sembly from the district of Montmartre and became the 
leader of the radical element of politicians. He had now 
definitely given up the practice of medicine and threw all 
his energies into politics and journalism. His first pub- 
lication was a daily paper. La Justice, which he established 
in 1880. In addition to journalism, Clemenceau became a 
man of letters and wrote novels and plays. These books 
were clever, but it is as a journalist that his writings will 
be remembered longest. His journals were the weapons 
with which he attacked his opponents in political life. The 
most famous of his publications was "L'Homme Libre" 
(The Free Man), which was started in 1912. In the fii'st 



THE PRIME MINISTERS 347 

years of the war Clemenceau brilliantly and fearlessly at- 
tacked through this publication all the forces that were 
harmful to France, both at home and abroad. 

Clemenceau was elected a member of the French Sen- 
ate in 1902, and in 1906 was raised to a position in the 
Cabinet, and in the same year became Prime Minister. 
He fell from power in 1908 and the following years were 
his most fruitful period as a wrecker of ministries. 

Much has been written about Clemenceau's life and 
personality. A great deal of it is legendary. In his youth 
he was fond of dueling. He delighted to make political 
enemies. He is said to retire by ten o'clock every night 
but is up at three in the morning to begin a long and hard 
day's work. Upon one thing everybody is agreed and that 
is his deep and passionate love of France. Her glory, her 
power, her beauty, these are the qualities of his country 
that he venerates and labors for. It was as much with 
these as for these that he won victory. 

A very great man is Eleutherios Venizelos, the Prime 
Minister of Greece. In spite of the fact that he was con- 
nected with a small state he had one of the most difficult 
tasks of any of the statesmen in the war. How he finally 
triumphed over circumstances and brought Greece to vic- 
tory on the side of the Allies you already know. Venizelos 
is the great man of the Balkans. In fact he is one of the 
great men of Europe, and it is of immense credit to his 
character and ability for one to be able to say this of him, 
chiefly because his energies have been restricted to the up- 
building of a small state. It must not be forgotten, how- 



348 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

ever, that this small state, Greece, has the most glorious 
traditions of any country in history for art, literature and 
philosophy. These are enough to inspire a man to great- 
ness. 

]M. Venizelos is a native of Crete, an island in the 
Mediterranean Sea, about eighty miles off the coast of 
Greece. The island was under Turkish rule and Venizelos 
organized a rebellion and threw off the Turkish yoke. 
Then he fought to have Crete made a part of the Greek 
nation. In this he succeeded too. In 1909 Venizelos went 
to Athens and his career of rebuilding Greece began. He 
was soon made the Prime Minister. This wonderful man 
in five years' time had practically made a new nation of 
his beloved Greece. He did it by solid constructive work. 
He wiped craft out of political life and strengthened 
through many reforms the University of Athens. More 
than two hundred municipal schools were established by 
him. He increased the efficiency of the police, postal and 
telegraph services. He organized a new ministry in the 
Cabinet which dealt with trade, industry and agriculture. 
And in keeping with modern conditions of labor he es- 
tablished the eight-hour day for the workingman. 

All of these are domestic reforms but Venizelos knew 
that Greece could not rise to an honorable and respected 
place among the states of Europe unless her national life 
was progressive. This accomplished, he turned to the 
broader field of international affairs. Much of the terri- 
tory that had belonged to ancient Greece he saw under 
the rule of Turkey. He desired to regain these lands that 



THE PRIME MINISTERS 349 

Greece might be greater and possessed of some of her an- 
cient glory. He also knew that the other small Balkan 
states, Serbia and Bulgaria, wanted to free the Balkan 
Peninsula of Turkish influence. So Venizelos organized 
the Balkan League to drive the Turks back into Asia and 
regain the lands that were inhabited by its kin. The first 
Balkan War was fought, Turkey defeated, and at last it 
looked as if the Balkans would settle down to peace and 
progressive existence. But alas, what had been an honest 
ambition on the part of the Greek statesman turned out 
otherwise. I have already told you in this narrative how 
the Balkans furnished the causes of the World War. In 
telling you something of the life of Venizelos I have 
showed you how his purposes, honest and patriotic, were 
behind the causes of the great conflict. No one can blame 
Venizelos for what happened. His record in the war is 
evidence enough of his upright and able character. The 
fruits of his own success gave him problems enough to 
deal with. He was often humiliated and defeated, but in 
the end came through as one of the great victorious Prime 
Ministers of the War. 



CHAPTER III 



THE GENERALS 



MORE is known of what the great generals of the 
Allied armies achieved in the war than was 
known of them before the war. Of all the men 
who had an important part in the great conflict the gen- 
erals of the armies had the most responsible as well as the 
most exacting duties to perform. Yet there were no men 
more cool, calm and collected than these warriors. With 
but very few exceptions the Allied generals were unknown 
to the world at large before the war. Even in their re- 
spective countries these men were scarcely known outside 
of the inner circles of the army. Lord Kitchener was 
perhaps the most famous of the Allied soldiers in August, 
1914. But he did not command in the field. England 
made him the Minister of War because his great organiz- 
ing ability was needed to build a large army to fight the 
Germans. Of the men who actually directed operations on 
the field of battle there were none who had a reputation 
equal to Kitchener's. Nearly all the French generals were 
unknown men. But they had the genius of great soldiers 
in them. Many of them felt certain that a great war with 
Germany was coming and had prepared themselves for it. 
The French have always been a great military people. 

350 



THE GENERALS 351 

The genius of warfare is in the blood of the Frenchmen 
and that is the reason France produced so many generals 
of the first rank in the war. Generals Gouraud, Mangin, 
Castelnau, Pau, Fayolle, D'Esperey, and others continued 
the traditions of the French military genius, and I am 
sorry that I cannot stop to tell you something of their 
lives. I shall take three of the most famous of these 
Frenchmen as typical illustrations. These three men are 
the greatest soldiers that the war produced. They are 
heroes every one. They are the three marshals of France, 
Joffre, Petain and Foch. The first, as you know, is the 
hero of the Battle of the Marne, the second is the hero of 
Verdun, and the third, one of the world's greatest soldiers 
of all time, was the hero in every battle he fought from 
the Battle of Nancy to the final great battle when he 
crushed the proud military might of the German empire. 

Joseph Jacques Cesaire Joffre was born in southern 
France in 1852, the son of a cooper. He attended the 
Polytechnic School at Paris and fought bravely when the 
Prussians besieged the city in 1870. For his fine work he 
was promoted to a captaincy. Joffre' s work in the army 
was conscientious. He has served in French China, in 
Madasgascar, in Africa, and various other far-away places. 
He rose not rapidly but steadily in rank and in 1911 was 
chief of staff of the French army. When the war broke 
out he was made commander-in-chief of the French 
armies. 

"Papa Joffre," as the great soldier is affectionately 
called by his troops, is very methodical and self-possessed. 



352 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

All his faculties are well-balanced. He has none of the 
feverish ambition associated with unusual gifts, but is 
simple and a great lover of home life. He exerts a re- 
markable power over his men but it is through the strength 
and confidence he inspires in them. They have faith that 
he would never fail them. His quiet habits, his steady, 
wide blue eyes are enough to command love and obedience. 

How happy would have been his humble father, the 
cooper, could he have lived to see the son whose early 
career he watched and cherished, become a marshal of 
France, the first marshal that had been created in the 
French army for nearly half a century! He was made 
a marshal in 1916, when he turned the command of the 
armies over to General Nivelle. Early in the spring of 
1917 Marshal Joffre visited the United States with the 
French War Mission, and was everywhere greeted with 
admiration and honor. 

Henri Philippe Petain, Marshal of France and com- 
mander-in-chief of the armies of France made one of the 
most brilliant reputations of any soldier in the war. Little 
is known of Petain's early life before the war. He was 
only a colonel when the war began, and was chiefly known 
before as a lecturer in the War College. In those days he 
kept very much to himself and had practically no intimates. 
The war brought out of him the best and highest elements 
of a great soldier. Petain has a very simple character, 
which is common, it should be noted, among the great 
soldiers of France. He always concentrates his strength 
upon the task in hand. Absolutely emotionless he is more 



THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 353 

like a machine than a man. His soldiers both feared and 
respected him. He has much of the compelling power 
that was a mystery but which made men do whatever he 
commanded. Petain leapt to fame as the defender of 
Verdun. It was his order, "They shall not pass!" which 
ran through the trenches and stiffened the determination 
of every French soldier to oppose his body as a wall against 
the German attack. 

Everybody is agreed that the greatest soldier of the 
war is Ferdinand Foch. This man of glorious achieve- 
ments was born in October, 1851, in the Department of the 
Hautes in the Pyrenees not very far from the birthplace 
of Marshal Joffre. He was a subaltern in the Franco- 
Prussian War and rose rapidly to the rank of Brigadier- 
General. He became the director of the Ecole de la 
Guerre where his lectures on military strategy had a deep 
and lasting influence upon the students. He is the author 
of two books on military science which attracted wide at- 
tention in Germany before the war and have since been 
very widely quoted. His military principles are based 
upon the strategy of Napoleon who is an idol of Marshal 
Foch. The idea underlying his principles is that a general 
must act according to circumstances, and in so acting first 
to secure the safety of his army. But even deeper than this 
principle is Marshal Foch's belief that war is a passionate 
drama in which moral force and spiritual qualities play an 
important part. 

No man in France was less surprised than Marshal 
Foch when war came in 1914. As a theorist he had won a 



354 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

fine reputation but the war gave him an opportunity to 
put his theories into practice. The war was not many 
months old when he proved greater in the practice of his 
theories than in the teaching of them. He soon came to 
be recognized in all the Allied countries by what Joffre 
called him, "The finest strategist in Europe." 

Foch was created a marshal in 1918. He is a devout 
Catholic. In spite of a certain austerity of character he is 
a man of rare physical grace and charm. The soldiers of 
high rank of all the Allied countries have a deep admira- 
tion for his genius and personality. One and all accepted 
his leadership in March, 1918, as the one man who could 
turn the tide of German victories and bring triumph to 
the Allied cause. 

Among the English generals reference must be made 
to two who rendered valuable service to their country, 
though both passed from public view before the war was 
over. Death overtook one, Lord Kitchener, in an accident 
at sea, and the other. Lord French, was relieved of his com- 
mand of the British Expeditionary Force. 

Lord Kitchener was born in Ireland in 1850 and as a 
student was regarded as dull in all of his studies except 
mathematics. He won his commission as a lieutenant in 
the Royal Engineers. He was appointed to a post in 
Egypt where he made a name for himself building rail- 
roads and organizing the business end of war. He had 
seen service in Africa, India and Egypt, notably in the 
Boer War, when he was Lord Roberts' right hand man. 
He won a title for taking Khartoum where General Gor- 



THE GENERALS 355 

don was besieged. He was too late to save Gordon but he 
cleared the Soudan of rebels and brought it under the 
control of Egypt. When the war broke out Kitchener 
was made Minister of War and organized England's gi'eat 
civilian army. Though a man of silent nature, he had 
an iron will that surmounted all obstacles that stood in his 
way. He was a hard worker and when a deed was to 
be done drove his men without mercy. In spite of all he 
was very popular with the masses of the English people. 
A stern soldier, he found a watery grave. 

Lord French was born at Ripple Vale, England, in 
1852, and is of Irish extraction. He has the Irishman's 
quick temper. He first joined the navy, but left it for the 
army. He has seen much active service both in Egypt and 
South Africa. Lord French has an attractive personality 
and is much liked by his officers and troops. His work in 
France in command of the first expeditionary force was 
notable for the retreat from Mons during the latter days 
of August and the early days of September of 1914. His 
generalship on this retreat in which he brought his army, 
fighting doggedly all the way, out of the jaws of the Ger- 
man trap, has won the admiration of military writers. 
There has been much controversy about the reasons for 
which he lost his command. Many believed it was due to 
political enemies at home. At all events he deserves much 
credit for the part he played in the early months of the 
war. 

General Sir Douglas Haig who was raised to the rank 
of a Field Marshal during the war is the highest type of 



356 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

the efficient modern soldier. He was one of Lord French's 
lieutenants when the war began and succeeded him in su- 
preme command of the British armies. General Haig is a 
Scotchman with all the methodical qualities of that type. 
He never made a move without working out in detail be- 
forehand all the problems that were involved. His career, 
like his conduct of the war, has been a matter of patient 
progress. General Haig is a man of great personal dis- 
tinction, being reserved and dignified in bearing. During 
the war wherever his headquarters were moved a cow was 
taken too, which supplied him with fresh pure milk of 
which he is very fond. For his services in leading the 
British army to victory the English Government has ex- 
pressed its appreciation by creating him an earl, and Par- 
liament has voted him a large sum of money to maintain 
the dignity of his new position. 

Two British generals who stand out more romantically 
against the background of the war than any of the others 
are Sir Frederick Stanley Maude who captured Bagdad, 
the ancient city of the Arabian Nights, and Sir Edmund 
Allenby who captured Jerusalem, the Sacred City of the 
Bible. These picturesque far-off campaigns were full of 
hardships and mysteries that will one day be told in thrill- 
ing stories. There was no more beloved officer in the Brit- 
ish army than General Maude. Yet he was a hard task- 
master who got the utmost out of his officers and men 
without much fuss. He had a habit of saying nothing 
about the things that were done right, but of the things 
that were done wrong he would speak in a way that the 



THE GENERALS 357 

men did not soon forget. He had a hard campaign up the 
Tigris to Bagdad and he won because of his iron will and 
determination. He died as you know, of cholera in the city 
of golden domes and minarets on November 18, 1917. 

General Allenby was taken from the western front in 
June, 1917, to conduct the campaign in Palestine. After 
going to school at Haileybury College where he cultivated 
a taste for literature, Allenby became a young officer of 
the dragoons. His first active service was in Africa at 
the age of twenty-three. He fought in the Zulu cam- 
paign of 1888, and in the Boer War. General Allenby has 
all the fine personal traits of the English scholar and 
gentleman. 

Italy had many fine soldiers in the war but only two 
of her commanders are fairly well known to the general 
public. Count Cadorna was commander-in-chief of the 
Italian armies from Italy's entry into the war until the 
disaster of Caporetto, when he was succeeded by General 
Armando Diaz who led the troops to victory. Cadorna 
held his command longer than any of the Allied generals 
who began the war. Cadorna was born on the border of 
Lago Maggiore between Lombardy and Britton. He, too, 
like so many of the Latin generals, has a silent nature and 
is unmoved by success. His devotion to Italy is intense. 
He has a touch of humor in his nature that is dehghtful. 

Among the Russian generals there are two who 
possessed undoubted mihtary genius. Both men were 
swept away by the forces of the Russian Revolution though 
one of them, the Grand Duke Nicholas, had been deposed 



S58 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

for the defeats of the Russian armies in Poland. Little 
was known of Grand Duke Nicholas before the war. He 
fought in the Russo-Japanese War and afterwards was 
given the task of reorganizing the Russian army. The 
fine showing made by the Czar's troops during the first 
year of the war is an evidence of how v/ell he did his task. 
The Grand Duke had two sides to his nature. One was 
the affable and highly cultivated Russian aristocrat, who 
was a charming companion. The other was the soldier, 
the cold, self-sufficient man of action who would send a 
hundred thousand men to death without the least concern 
so that he attained his end. He exercised the severest dis- 
cipline among the troops. They believed, however, in his 
ability and trusted^ him entirely. He had the knack of 
making quick decisions which is a great virtue in a soldier. 
The Grand Duke was an ardent patriot and labored hard 
for the good of Russia, but he could not stay the flood of 
revolution which swept himself and his cousin, the Czar, 
and all the aristocrats away. 

General BrusilofF was the other Russian commander 
with high military talents. He also was an aristocrat, who 
as a young cavalry man attracted the attention of Grand 
Duke Nicholas, who advanced him rapidly in the army. At 
the outbreak of the war Brusiloff had his choice of joining 
an exclusive regiment of guards but he preferred to attach 
himself to the Caucasus Cavalry Regiment. He was a 
regular dictator and would not permit even his high offi- 
cers to contradict him. He was placed in supreme com- 
mand of the Revolutionary Army, a rather unusual ap- 



THE GENERALS 359 

pointment owing to his aristocratic connections, but the 
people trusted and admired him. 

The commander-in-chief of the American Expedition- 
ary Forces, John Joseph Pershing, was born at Laclede, 
Lynn County, Mo., September 13, 1860. It should be 
noted that it was on September 13, 1918, that the first 
independent operation of the American army in France 
was made in the St. Mihiel offensive. General Pershing's 
birthday in 1918 will always be memorable for him and the 
American people. 

The General's ancestors, John and Frederick Pershing, 
came from France in 1749, and settled in Pennsylvania. 
As a youth Pershing worked on his father's farm, and 
afterwards taught school for a while at Prairie Mount, 
Chariton County, IMissouri. He won the first competitive 
examination for a cadetship at West Point in the Tenth 
Missouri District. Pie graduated in 1886 as second lieu- 
tenant in the Sixth United States Cavalry. 

As a young officer Pershing fought in the Indian cam- 
paigns in New Mexico, Arizona and Dakota. In 1898, 
in the Spanish- American War, Pershing commanded the 
colored troops of the Tenth Cavalry who fought so 
heroically at Santiago. After the Spanish War Pershing 
organized and was chief of the Bureau of Insular Affairs. 
His next active service was in the Philippines, command- 
ing the military operations against the Moros in central 
Mindanao. During the Russo-Japanese War Pershing 
was military attache in Japan and was with General 
Kuroki's army in the Manchurian campaign. Returning 



360 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

to the Philippines in 1906 Pershing became commander 
of the Department of Mindanao and Governor of Poro 
Province, and resuming his operations against the Moros 
finally and completely subdued them near Bagsag in 
June, 1913. 

Pershing next returned to the United States to com- 
mand the Eighth Brigade at the Presidio, San Francisco, 
California. It was here that the General's wife and three 
daughters were burned to death in a fire that took place on 
August 27, 1915. 

The General's next duty was on the Mexican border. 
He commanded the patrol in the El Paso district, and 
later, in March, 1916, led the American troops across the 
border in pursuit of Villa. 

When the United States declared war against Ger- 
many Pershing was given the command of the American 
Expeditionary Forces, with the rank of a full general. 
With his staff he reached Europe in June, 1917. He is 
the only supreme commander among the belligerents on 
either side who began and ended the war in that position. 
After more than two years abroad General Pershing re- 
turned home on September 8, 1919, and was welcomed at 
New York by the people as no military hero has ever been 
welcomed in the nation's history. On Wednesday, Sep- 
tember 10th, General Pershing led the men of the First 
Division in a great parade down New York's famous Fifth 
Avenue amidst the thunderous plaudits of an immense 
throng. An incident of this parade marks the simple 
greatness of Pershing's character. The venerable and 



THE GENERALS 361 

heroic Cardinal Mercier of Belgium, who had just landed 
at New York on his visit to America, was watching the 
parade from a reviewing stand with the dignitaries of the 
church and state. When General Pershing rode opposite 
to where the Cardinal stood, he halted the procession, dis- 
mounted from his horse, walked over to the reviewing stand 
and greeted the venerable prelate. It was the homage paid 
by one great man to another, and for all the world to 
witness. 

While abroad General Pershing received many honors 
and decorations from the Allied Governments, the most 
notable being the Star and Ribbon of the Legion of Honor 
bestowed by France. He is the only American soldier to 
receive this decoration. His own country has fully ap- 
preciated his services. On his arrival home Secretary of 
War Newton D. Baker met the commander-in-chief as he 
came ashore and presented him with his commission as a 
full general which Congress had voted him, and which he 
is the fifth soldier in the history of America to receive 
after Washington, Grant, Sherman and Sheridan. 



CHAPTER IV 



THE ADMIRALS 



YOU know what an active but silent part the navy 
played in the war. We know little yet in detail 
of the great work the seamen did in all those four 
years of dangerous labors. It can be said of the navies of 
all the Allied nations that they did their share towards vic- 
tory and did it well. They got very little praise and no 
celebrations, but the seaman can well say that without his 
help the war could not have been won. 

The naval battles of the war were few, and only one 
v/as of major importance, but every man on every ship 
that fought, or convoyed troopships, that swept mine fields 
or hunted submarines was a hero. And the men who com- 
manded these unknown heroes were gallant sailors too, 
though they wore the gold braid and insignia of high rank. 
All of these admirals are proud of the fact that they are 
sailors first and admirals afterwards. I am going to give 
you an impression of the four admirals who were the most 
famous during the war. Two of these are Englishmen 
and two Americans. 

Admiral Sir David Beatty, to whom the German Fleet 
surrendered, is the embodiment of the typical naval hero 
of English history. Admiral Beatty was once described 

3G2 



THE ADMIRALS 363 

by a seaman as a man with the spirit of Sir Francis Drake ; 
a man with flashing eyes and "a soul like a North Sea 
storm." In the Battle of Jutland he proved that this 
characterization was true. He succeeded Admiral Jellicoe 
in command of the Grand Fleet after the Battle of Jut- 
land. When the German admiral visited Beatty to ar- 
range for the surrender of the entire German navy, he 
presented him with a petition asking that the crews should 
be well treated by the British. Admiral Beatty after 
looking at the petition tore it up and addressing the Ger- 
man said, "Tell them they are coming to England, that 
will be enough." This is the spirit of the British navy, 
the spirit of fight hard and fair play. No admiral em- 
bodied that spirit more fully than the young and dashing 
David Beatty with the "soul like a North Sea storm." 

To Admiral Jellicoe goes the credit of building up the 
efficiency of the Grand Fleet. He has, it has been said, 
in his nature the "candor of the sea," How he fought the 
Battle of Jutland you have been told, and if he has the 
candor of the sea he also has the caution of a thoughtful 
patriot. After turning over the command of the Grand 
Fleet to Sir David Beatty, Admiral Jellicoe was made 
First Lord of the Admiralty with the policy and strategy 
of the navy under his direction. He did splendid service 
in this position in curbing the submarine warfare. The 
triumph of the British navy in the war was largely due to 
these two admirals. 

America's contribution to the naval supremacy of the 
Allies was much more considerable than is generally 



364 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

known. Along the French coast as well as in the North 
Sea, and off the west coast of Ireland, our battleships and 
destroyers did valiant service of many kinds. The ad- 
miral in supreme command of the American navy in Eu- 
ropean waters was Admiral William S. Sims. The su- 
periority of gunnery in the American navy is due to his 
persistent plea for target practice. A farmer's son. Ad- 
miral Sims graduated from the Naval Academy at 
Annapolis in 1880. He was appointed instructor of target 
practice and was allowed to use his own system in teach- 
ing. After seven years as an instructor of target practice 
he was given a post with the Bureau of Navigation. In 
1913 he was given the command of the Atlantic Fleet. He 
made a splendid reputation in Europe during the war 
and was much liked for his charming personal qualities. 
Admiral Hugh Rodman who has commanded four dif- 
ferent battleship divisions of the Atlantic Fleet is a very 
able officer who has the confidence of his superiors and the 
enthusiastic devotion of his subordinates. His fame as a 
wit runs back to his student days at Annapolis when he 
delighted to outwit his instructors. In his early career at 
sea he held more important posts than falls to the lot of 
the average young man. He has been in command of the 
Mare Island Navy Yard, was in charge of the operations 
in Panama, has served on the General Board of the Navy 
and as a director of the Panama Railroad Company. In 
the summer of 1919 after bringing the Atlantic Fleet from 
Europe he took it through the Panama Canal and up the 



THE ADMIRALS 365 

Pacific coast to San Francisco. Admiral Rodman has a 
cheerful personality which impresses every one whom he 
meets. As to the wit of the American, his reputation is as 
wide as the seven seas. 



THE PEACE CONFERENCE AT PARIS 




From French OfUcial Fhotograth 

Reproduced by Permission of " The Ladies' Home Journal " 



Curtis Fublishiug Company 



IN THE CATHEDRAL AT MEAUX WAS HELD A THANKSGIVING OF COMRADES 

IN ARMS 



THE STORY OF THE PEACE CONFERENCE 

THE Peace Conference opened in Paris on Janu- 
ary 15, 1918, where delegates from all the 
Allied and Associated Nations in the war against 
Germany and her Allies met to settle upon the terms of a 
treaty for the formal ending of the war. Georges Cle- 
menceau, the Prime Minister of France, was elected chair- 
man of the Conference. The American delegates were 
President Wilson, Colonel Edward M. House, Robert 
Lansing, the Secretary of State, General Tasker H. Bliss 
and Henry W. White. A great army of experts on vari- 
ous problems were sent by the nations to advise the chief 
commissioners and to work their decisions into the text of 
the treaty. A Council of Ten was formed which con- 
sisted of the foreign secretaries of the larger nations. But 
all the decisions were finally made by a Supreme Council 
of the five great powers, the United States, Great Britain, 
France, Italy and Japan. 

After six months of exacting and laborious work the 
Treaty with Germany was finished and signed at the 
Palace of Versailles on June 28, 1919. 

The terms of the Treaty were the severest ever pre- 
sented to a conquered nation. By it Germany lost all her 
colonies. All the men in Germany who were responsible 
for the war and its crimes, which are described under thirty 

369 



370 THE STORY OF THE GREAT WAR 

heads, were to be surrendered for trial by the Allies. 
Germany was to return all the goods and money stolen 
from occupied territories, and to pay the cost of the war 
in indemnities which would be determined by a commission 
appointed to work out the details. Germany was made to 
give up territory on her eastern frontier, which was Polish, 
to the Poles, and the City of Danzig was made a free city. 
Alsace and Lorraine were returned to France, and France 
was to be allowed to control and work the coal mines in 
the Saar Basin in compensation for the German destruc- 
tion of the coal mines around Lens. On the left bank of 
the Rhine for a distance of fifty kilometers Germany was 
not to maintain any forts or armed forces or hold military 
maneuvers. The German army was to be reduced to a 
force not exceeding 100,000 men and 4,000 officers. With- 
in three months after the signing of the Treaty, Germany 
must close all establishments for the manufacturing, prep- 
aration, storage or design of arms and munitions of war 
and poisonous gases, and was not to import or manufacture 
these for exportation. The entire German navy was to be 
surrendered to the British, all military and naval aircraft 
likewise to be surrendered. Germany was to replace with 
her merchant ships ton for ton all the Allied ships that 
were lost or damaged owing to the war. The economic 
resources of the German nation were to be used towards 
the physical restoration of the areas devastated by the 
German armies. Germany was to renounce the treaties of 
Brest-Litovsk and Bucharest made with Russia and 
Roumania. 



u(^ B» 



- 6 6. 



THE PEACE CONFERENCE 371 

These are the most important clauses in the Treaty of 
a general nature that Germany had to accept. The Ger- 
mans protested strongly against the harshness of the 
terms, but rendered helpless by the terms of the armistice 
there was nothing else to do but accept them and acknowl- 
edge defeat. 

A notable part of the Treaty was the inclusion of the 
covenant for a League of Nations which was accepted by 
the ratification of the Treaty in many of the Allied coun- 
tries and placed before the United States Senate for 
ratification. 



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